''I've got this great talent. I don't know how I got it or how I developed it. But as soon as I get on a plane I fall asleep. And my talent is, Ian, that as soon as they come by with the trolley, I wake up. I've never missed a meal!''

Without this talent and with a mortal's vulnerability to travel fatigue, his kind of career would be hard to sustain. It's not only the frequent criss-crossing of the world but the way in which in Europe he is always beetling to and fro between cities (usually by rail). He explains that when he's conducting a season of opera in one city - Vienna, say - and there's a lull in that season, he zooms off to another city - Budapest, say - to conduct an orchestra in a concert. He says that even his managers, used to frenzied careers, think him ''very busy''. Some of that busyness is enabled because, with no wife and children, ''music is my life''.

A columnist tries not to gush but I do hero-worship Milton. To somehow have got three-quarters of an hour of his scarce, 22-carat time, felt a great privilege. We talked in a cupboard-sized office in the CSO's premises in Civic. Given my culture crush on him, my impressions are not to be trusted but Milton's manner seemed cautious (and he was too cautious to answer on the record my questions about the School of Music imbroglio) but earnest and passionate. I've never interviewed anyone who has examined my face quite so intently and warily. Used to seeing him in action on the podium, he seemed unnaturally still, caged even, in our cupboard.

There's a joy and an excellence about the CSO's concerts given with this 44-year-old Australian-born child of Australian and Hungarian parents. Canberrans who think they don't care for classical music ought to give it just one chance during Milton's reign. (How he wishes, he says, that Australians were as enthusiastic about music as they are about football.) It's not only that the orchestra's playing is shimmeringly lovely now but that Milton himself is such an entertainer. He talks to the audience in ways haughty old conductors never used to and does and says witty things. Once the CSO launched into an overture without him anywhere to be seen. Suddenly he came dashing up the stairs and leapt aboard the already moving overture like a desperate commuter catching a moving bus. Once, as a variation on the theme of telling us to switch off our mobile phones, he turned to look at us, his mobile face etched with mock concern and pleaded with us ''Ladies and gentlemen, whatever you do, please, please remember to switch your mobile phones back on after the concert!''

He is stirring to watch, too. He is the most demonstrative conductor you'll ever see. He makes the Whirling Dervishes look heavily sedated. ''I think I forget myself when I conduct. I go into a performance thinking to myself, 'OK. Stand up straight. Just be a little dignified.' And then the music begins and suddenly I'm in another place and doing whatever I need to do. I'm the only person on stage not making any sound at all. The job of a conductor is to inspire the musicians to want to give their best. It's a mystery how that works. All I know is it seems to be working for me, internationally and here in Canberra.

''But here in Canberra I really feel I'm given way to much credit [for the ''chemistry'' that's generated]. Everyone with this orchestra is so passionate. You see the animation on stage. Not just from me but from every musician there … we have a joyful approach here.''

Milton is doing a lot of vaunted work in Europe, where he's regarded as the bee's knees, but he is passionately Australian and so is passionately upset by some Australian foibles. So as someone who's made sure the CSO uses some Australian conductors and Australian soloists and plays some Australian music, our lingering cultural cringe is his ''pet peeve''. He fumes that Australian orchestras still prefer to use what they call ''international soloists''. It irks him ''that in this country the word 'international' is an adjective that refers to something that must be good. I have a huge problem with that. As soon as you say 'international artist' it implies that he or she is bound to be better than what we have here, and I find that offensive.''

A wit has said that talking and writing about music is as futile as dancing about architecture (because music deals with hard-to-describe emotions) but, perhaps blinded by my crush, it seems as if Milton really does know how to talk about it.

''Very often I say to musicians 'Just remember what business we're in. We're in the beauty business. The business of making something beautiful. Something that in some mysterious way touches people's souls.' ''