He has been seeing a woman from Utah, Melinda Gomez, a former model who makes designer handbags. She came to Boston in May for opening night at the Pops, sitting at Lockhart's table at the post-concert party.

"It's no secret I've had personal problems," Lockhart says. "I am dating, albeit somewhat cautiously. It's not at all inappropriate that I'm going to start putting my toe back in the water. But my big emotional trauma and goal is to work out the nature of my ongoing relationship with my son and my son's mother. That takes precedence over everything."

His career, though, can be all-consuming. Lockhart sleeps five hours a night. When his parents visit, they barely see him for meals. He spends much of his time holed up in his room studying scores.

The intensity of the job isn't all he shares with Fiedler. Like the late conductor, Lockhart longs to be known for more than "lite" music. He calls his career "unique," as it combines full-time Pops and Utah gigs. No music director has done both at a high-profile level.

"We talked about it before he took the Pops job," says Hugh Kaylor, Lockhart's former manager. "I knew he wanted these other things, that he wanted to do serious work. We just felt it was a risk well worth taking. The Boston Pops is a plum job. It's the kind of job you can never say no to."

Ten years ago, during contract negotiations, Lockhart tried to make sure he didn't become the next Lawrence Welk. He asked for a clause prohibiting him from playing Pops concerts with anyone other than the Boston Pops. It was a strange decision for a young conductor about to take his first high-profile gig. After all, in the world of the modern-day maestro, jet-setting conductors cash in by cramming high-paying guest spots into off weeks.

Lockhart, though, felt it was more important to deliver a message to major orchestras.

"You can't take the easy way out," says Lockhart. "You can't just say, 'We want him because he'll sell our tickets to people who have seen him on TV.' You gotta want me for some reason other than that."

The trouble is that since Lockhart scored the Pops job, he has watched as other conductors his age pass him by.

Robert Spano, the music director of the Atlanta Symphony Orchestra, and David Robertson, music director of the Saint Louis Symphony, have led the major orchestras in New York, Chicago, Philadelphia, and Boston. Marin Alsop and Alan Gilbert have also appeared with most of the country's most prominent symphonies.

Lockhart has been stuck on the B-circuit. He does Toronto, Columbus, Edmonton. When the Chicago Symphony calls, it is to ask him to play with its Civic Orchestra, a training group for aspiring young musicians.