This film profile is timely‚ just as Antonio Pappano takes over as music director at Covent Garden. It is a study that follows his career from childhood in London‚ through teenage years in Bridgeport‚ Connecticut‚ where his Italian parents took the family‚ and on to his time working in Brussels and Bayreuth as well as London. What is striking is the way that at key points influential figures have instantly recognised Pappano’s magnetism. When he was still a répétiteur in the 1980s‚ he went to Bayreuth to accompany Deborah Polaski in an audition with Daniel Barenboim for the role of Brünnhilde. Barenboim remembers that‚ even before Polaski sang‚ his prompt response was to spot the ‘bundle of energy at the piano’. Instantly‚ he said: ‘Him I want!’ Equally‚ when Pappano was conducting an opera for the first time‚ La bohème in Oslo in 1987‚ the director of the La Monnaie Opera in Brussels‚ scouting for talent‚ remembers that ‘after a few bars‚ I knew he was exceptional’. Pappano went to Brussels‚ and spent a full 10 years there. I remember sampling the opening of his EMI recording of La bohème (10/96) with few expectations‚ having read a tepid review‚ and instantly found my ears on stalks‚ magnetised by what I heard. One of the players in the orchestra at La Monnaie notes how instantly Pappano ‘broadened our sound palette’‚ and singer Susan Chilcott‚ describing him as ‘so vital‚ so enthusiastic‚ so inspiring’‚ finds that he ‘lifted you to another level’. Equally‚ baritone Dale Duesing‚ who you see being rehearsed in Boesmans’ opera Wintermärchen‚ says he ‘makes you do things you thought you couldn’t’. The film follows Pappano first to the block of flats off Victoria Street in London where he lived as a child. He describes the games he played in the yard‚ and the way that as a budding pianist he would go to his father’s studio and accompany the singers being taught there. Family photographs show the three­year­old stretching up to a piano keyboard‚ and opening his arms wide as though about to conduct. In Bridgeport – scene of an extended sequence in the film – the teenager was sponsored by a piano teacher‚ Norma Verrilli. Quickly shedding his English accent‚ he almost became part of the family‚ using the Verrilli house for piano­practice. He went on‚ by the age of 15‚ to play in church as well as to accompany singers at his father’s studio‚ the local university and in a cocktail bar. I was reminded of the early career of André Previn‚ except that Bridgeport‚ unlike Los Angeles‚ didn’t bring Pappano into contact with international stars. Norma Verrilli suggests that Pappano’s ‘gregarious nature was what led him to conduct’‚ pointing out that by contrast the life of a solo pianist involves so much work alone. By the early 1980s he realised that he had to go to Europe if he was going to progress‚ and that is how he first established himself as a répétiteur. The film follows him to Brussels and Bayreuth as well as to London‚ with performances of the Verdi Requiem – rehearsed in multiple languages – as a recurrent theme. It makes an impressive and amiable portrait‚ when the subject is so open about himself. He ascribes to his Italian parentage his lyricism‚ to his American background his openness and to his English roots his discipline. It is a good combination‚ and though at the moment he still thinks of Brussels as his home‚ the prospects for his years at Covent Garden could not be brighter. As a special feature‚ the DVD has a complete performance of the Brahms Intermezzo Op 116 No 4 – a clip of which is included in the main film – with Pappano as warmly expressive and dramatic at the piano playing Brahms as he is conducting Verdi or Puccini. My only regret is that Pappano’s musician wife – herself a répétiteur – is not in the film‚ and‚ irritatingly‚ the full 76 minutes has only a single DVD track‚ making it very difficult to check anything in the middle.