Composer Quotes - Page 13

• I sort of enjoy being able to hear what other composers are doing and how they might score something differently than me. I enjoy that part.

  Marco Beltrami

  Might, Able, Score

  "More With Marco". Interview with Spence D., www.ign.com. July 18, 2003.

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• Composers combine notes, that's all.

  Igor Stravinsky

  Notes

  Igor Stravinsky, Robert Craft (1982). “Dialogues”, p.52, Univ of California Press

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• Good composers don't borrow, they steal

  Igor Stravinsky

  Stealing

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• I shall be the first composer in history not to have a biography.

  Pierre Boulez

  Biographies, Firsts

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• In my view, the composer,
  just as the poet, the sculptor or the painter,
  is in duty bound to serve Man, the people.
  He must beautify life and defend it.
  He must be a citizen first and foremost,
  so that his art might consciously extol human life
  and lead man to a radiant future.

  Sergei Prokofiev

  Art, Men, Views

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• Every piece of music is a form of personal expression for its creator...If a work doesnt express the composers own personal point of view, his own ideas, then it doesnt, in my opinion, even deserve to be born.

  Dmitri Shostakovich

  Views, Expression, Ideas

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• Thus, if a composer wants to produce music that is relevant to his contemporaries, his chief problem is not really musical, though it may seem to him to be so; it is a problem of attitude to contemporary society and culture in relation to the basic human problem of learning to be human.

  John Blacking

  Music, Attitude, Culture

  John Blacking (1974). “How Musical is Man?”, p.104, University of Washington Press

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• If the reader were so rash as to purchase any of Bela Bartok's compositions, he would find that they each and all consist of unmeaning bunches of notes, apparently representing the composer promenading the keyboard in his boots. Some can be played better with the elbows, others with the flat of the hand. None require fingers to perform or ears to listen too.

  Frederick Corder

  Hands, Musical, Boots

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• To Strauss the composer I take off my hat; to Strauss the man I put it back on again.

  Arturo Toscanini

  Men, Hats, He Man

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• Although in society in general, the idea of an Irish composer of 'classical music', or whatever you want to call it, is still a strange item, generally speaking. Even in the arts, among our fellow creative artists in other disciplines, you still feel slightly out of it.

  John Kinsella

  Art, Ideas, Discipline

  Source: www.cmc.ie

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• Not many composers have ideas. Far more of them know how to use strange instruments which do not require ideas.

  George Gershwin

  Ideas, Use, Strange

  1930 'The Composer in the Machine Age'.

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• ... Andres Segovia literally created the genre of classical guitar, which hadn't existed before around 1910. There was flamenco, which he borrowed from, but he actually arranged the works of Mozart and other classical composers for guitar, something that had never been done before ... Segovias' style is not slick or contrived, but it's still very clean and his timing is impeccable ... it's got a feeling of casual elegance, as if he's sitting around the house in Spain with a jug of wine, just playing from the heart.

  Roger McGuinn

  Music, Heart, Wine

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• I had been to São Paulo the year before and became pretty well acquainted with the music of composer Antonio Carlos Jobim, I had already started playing that music, and the audience response had been pretty good because those songs are so melodic. I knew it would be something that would be appealing; I wasn't thinking that it would make the top of the pop charts or anything like that.

  Charlie Byrd

  Music, Song, Thinking

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• I am convinced that each work of art, be it a great work of genius or something very small, has its own life, and it will come to the artist, the composer or the writer or the painter, and
  say, "Here I am: compose me; or write me; or paint me"; and the job of the artist is to serve the work.

  Madeleine L'Engle

  Art, Jobs, Writing

  Madeleine L'Engle (2016). “The Irrational Season”, p.106, Open Road Media

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• Wagner exploited all forms of expression at a composer's disposal - harmony, dynamics, orchestration - to the extreme. His music is highly emotional, and at the same time Wagner has extraordinary control over the effect he achieves.

  Daniel Barenboim

  Emotional, Expression, Dynamics

  Interview with Joachim Kronsbein and Bernhard Zand, www.spiegel.de. June 22, 2012.

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• I've always had my ear peeled for interesting music. As a student, I regularly spent time hunting for interesting repertoire, looking through music bins, buying stacks and stacks of CDs, and discovering rarely played pieces by composers.

  Anne Akiko Meyers

  Hunting, Cds, Interesting

  Interview with Elijah Ho, www.thecounterpoints.com. October 16, 2014.

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• Bad facts make bad law, and people who write bad laws are in my opinion more dangerous than songwriters who celebrate sexuality. Freedom of speech, freedom of religious thought, and the right to due process for composers, performers and retailers are imperiled if the PMRC and the major labels consummate this nasty bargain.

  Frank Zappa

  Religious, Writing, Law

  Frank Zappa, Peter Occhiogrosso (1990). “Real Frank Zappa Book”, p.276, Simon and Schuster

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• There is more to creative mastership than the surface of satisfaction and political certainty. The music of Joe Fonda is part of a living tradition of belief and dedication. Future historians will be surprised at the breadth of Mr. Fonda's offerings. This is a real virtuoso and composer of the highest order.

  Anthony Braxton

  Real, Dedication, Offering

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• Out of the choked Devonian waters emerged sight and sound and the music that rolls invisible through the composer's brain. They are there still in the ooze along the tideline, though no one notices. The world is fixed, we say: fish in the sea, birds in the air. But in the mangrove swamps by the Niger, fish climb trees and ogle uneasy naturalists who try unsuccessfully to chase them back to the water. There are things still coming ashore.

  Loren Eiseley

  Sight, Air, Sea

  Loren Eiseley (2011). “The Immense Journey: An Imaginative Naturalist Explores the Mysteries of Man and Nature”, p.54, Vintage

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• Wynton Marsalis' skills have grown as fast as his ambition, and he is the most ambitious younger composer in Jazz.

  Jon Pareles

  Ambition, Skills, Ambitious

  "Review/Jazz; Wynton Marsalis Takes a Long Look at Slavery". www.nytimes.com. April 04, 1994.

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• It’s really strange, but they speak to me — the notes and the chords. So when I hear other people’s music, I can feel the composer. Whoever created that, I can see in their soul.

  Yanni

  People, Soul, Strange

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• I was very drawn to music of all types, from Beethoven to Jimi Hendrix. There were musicians and composers who obviously were expressing a vision that was beyond the mundane.

  Frederick Lenz

  Vision, Musician, Rama

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• The composers hated me. The singers detested me. The guitarists were terrified by me.

  Bulat Okudzhava

  Singers, Hated, Terrified

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• Freddie Bryant is a brilliant young guitarist and composer.

  Kenny Burrell

  Brilliant, Young, Guitarist

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• Tim Price continues to explore and develop his deeply personal approach to music. Through the years his persistence, determination and passion has enabled him to create a stellar reputation as a multiple woodwind master, composer, producer, author and last but not least educator. Tim is one of the best musicians active today and I'm happy to say he's my friend.

  Bennie Maupin

  Determination, Passion, Persistence

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