Talk:Michael Tilson Thomas
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 | Michael Tilson Thomas is currently a Music good article nominee. Nominated by Gerda Arendt (talk) at 07:50, 1 May 2026 (UTC) This article is ready to be reviewed in accordance with the good article criteria. Any editor who has not nominated or contributed significantly to this article may review the article and decide if it should be listed as a good article. To start the review process, click start review and then save the page. See the instructions. |
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Categorizations
I removed some categories because I could find no sourced assertions in the article that supported them. Someone else put them back asserting that they are in fact there. I still can't see them - maybe I've gone blind or have forgotten how to read. Not interested in starting a revert war, but for the record, I think it would be nice to have the assertions and sources pointed out more clearly. Mrhsj 17:25, 5 January 2007 (UTC)
Explicit declarations
yes, mtt is gay...and openly so. though it is not express in the article--and there's nothing in the mos requiring such declarations--at least one of the links makes an implicit ~and~ an explicit reference to orientation. --emerson7 | Talk 07:08, 16 June 2007 (UTC)
- Would you care to provide a reference? Or at least tell us which link to follow? Thanks. Grover cleveland 09:10, 16 June 2007 (UTC)
- So why don't you just add the sentence "MTT is gay" in the article and provide a citation? Not every reader of the article will know that. It is wrong to assert it indirectly via categorization. Mrhsj 15:21, 16 June 2007 (UTC)
- Michael Tilson Thomas GLBTQ Encyclopedia --emerson7 | Talk 22:07, 16 June 2007 (UTC)
- According to WP:BLP "Category names do not carry disclaimers or modifiers, so the case for the category must be made clear by the article text. The article must state the facts that result in the use of the category tag and these facts must be sourced." and also "Category tags regarding religious beliefs and sexual preference should not be used unless...The subject's beliefs or sexual preferences are relevant to the subject's notable activities or public life, according to reliable published sources.". I'm removing all categories not supported and sourced in the article on the basis of this policy. Grover cleveland 06:55, 24 June 2007 (UTC)
- Just FYI, the LGBT cats are now viable, as I added a confirmation source to the reference section. --Xiaphias 19:15, 29 June 2007 (UTC)
There was some relevant material removed with this edit three years ago. Since the content is necessary to support the categories, I'll re-add it. Melchoir (talk) 06:31, 12 May 2012 (UTC)
Last name
I think, he should be sorted as "Tilson Thomas, Michael" instead of "Thomas, Michael Tilson", see e.g. . Any comments? --FordPrefect42 (talk) 11:01, 3 February 2008 (UTC)
- Yes, his (professional) last name is Tilson Thomas, and all last-name references to him in the article should be changed. 76.170.117.188 76.170.117.188 (talk) 05:28, 1 July 2008 (UTC) 05:27, 1 July 2008 (UTC)
If the person originally known (including when he conducted the Boston Symphony Orchestra in the early seventies, if not later) as "Mike Thomas" professionally moved the divider between forenames and surname, as is asserted above, it is worthy of special mention in the main article--since this procedure is, as far as I know, unique to MTT--and should be sourced. Otherwise he should be referred to as "Thomas," which is, after all, his legal surname. Ccerf (talk) 03:53, 18 November 2008 (UTC)
- On his own official website, he refers to himself, obliquely, as "Mr Tilson Thomas". Regardless of what his legal surname may be, anyone can choose a different name for professional purposes. It looks like we should change all "Thomas" references to "Tilson Thomas", including defaultsort. -- Jack of Oz [your turn] 10:32, 1 February 2011 (UTC)
Has he formally done this, or is he merely letting the Brits assume that he is double-barrelled gentry without correcting them?173.76.224.35 (talk) 19:28, 7 December 2013 (UTC)
So, here in 2020, there is still no evidence cited to support referring to Thomas as "Tilson Thomas"; no evidence that his surname is not simply "Thomas". In this article and interview from 2011 [ https://jewishweek.timesofisrael.com/second-avenue-runs-in-the-family ] he is consistently called "Thomas", and he describes how his surname came to be Thomas, in direct quotations, and he mentions how he considered changing it "back" to Thomashevsy, and why his father originally changed his surname to Thomas (from Thomashevsky) prior to MTT's birth. In the face of a complete lack of reliable sources saying that "Tilson Thomas" is his surname, Occam would shave on the assumption that his name is "Thomas." A previous comment seems to have a link, but it's dead. Any secondary source following the trend of using the double surname, without containing an explanation or citation, should be over-ruled by Thomas's own words in the Times of Israel article I cited. His own website's "oblique reference" should also be over-ruled by his own clear statements in the Times. 174.196.199.245 (talk) 01:40, 24 October 2020 (UTC)
- Why was the comment just above apparently ignored? Isn't his surname "Thomas," not "Tilson Thomas"? If his surname is "Tilson Thomas," why is there not a single word of explanation in the current version of this article about why that is? 76.190.213.189 (talk) 18:28, 14 January 2023 (UTC)
- His obituary in the New York Times refers to him as "Mr. Thomas", while AP refers to him by "Tilson Thomas". —Bagumba (talk) 06:29, 24 April 2026 (UTC)