Composer Quotes - Page 8

• Any composer who is gloriously conscious that he is a composer must believe that he receives his inspiration from a source higher than himself.

  John Philip Sousa

  Believe, Inspiration, Conscious

  John Philip Sousa (2010). “Six marches”, p.46, A-R Editions, Inc.

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• To study music, we must learn the rules. To create music, we must break them.

  Nadia Boulanger

  Music, Creativity, Breaking Rules

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• Whether I was in my body or out of my body as I wrote it I know not. God knows.

  George Frideric Handel

  Music, God, Writing

  Of the'Hallelujah Chorus' in his Messiah. Quoted in Romain Rolland Essays on Music (1948).

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• When I’m creating at the piano, I tend to feel happy; but - the eternal dilemma - how can we be happy amid the unhappiness of others? I'd do everything I could to give everyone a moment of happiness. That's what's at the heart of my music.

  Nino Rota

  Happiness, Music, Being Happy

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• It's a great thing about being a musician; you don't stop until the day you die, you can improve. So it's a wonderful thing to do.

  Marcus Miller

  Inspirational, Music, African American

  Interview with Eva Simontacchi, www.jazzitalia.net. April 10, 2005.

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• One of the reasons I believe in jazz is that the oneness of man can come through the rhythm of your heart. It’s the same anyplace in the world, that heartbeat. It’s the first thing you hear when you’re born — or before you’re born — and it’s the last thing you hear.

  Dave Brubeck

  Music, Believe, Heart

  "Biography/ Personal Quotes". www.imdb.com.

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• Tim Price is one of the real ones !
  A good friend and a great player !

  Phil Woods

  Real, Good Friend, Player

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• I'm a revolutionary, money means nothing to me.

  Frederic Chopin

  Life, Music, Money

  "Chopin". Book by Arthur Hedley,, 1947.

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• 

  We are buried beneath the weight of information, which is being confused with knowledge; quantity is being confused with abundance and wealth with happiness. We are monkeys with money and guns.

  Tom Waits

  Happiness, Money, Confused

  "Tom Waits Interviews Tom Waits". www.npr.org. May 20, 2008.

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• It is dreadful when something weighs on your mind, not to have a soul to unburden yourself to. You know what I mean. I tell my piano the things I used to tell you.

  Frederic Chopin

  Life, Music, Philosophy

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• A happy person is not a person in a certain set of circumstances, but rather a person with a certain set of attitudes.

  Hugh Downs

  Inspirational, Motivational, Positive

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• The terror of performing never goes away. Instead, you get very, very comfortable being terrified.

  Eric Whitacre

  Feelings, Going Away, Performing

  Twitter post from May 20, 2016

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• It doesn't necessarily mean at all that the composer plays his own works best.

  Leo Ornstein

  Mean, Play

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• To me, all writing is like music. And especially dialogue. I studied music in college; that is what I wanted to be, a composer. Acting got me sidetracked.

  Dirk Benedict

  Writing, College, Acting

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• There are no black film composers doing the likes of Star Wars, doing the likes of E.T., doing the likes of Jurassic Park. There are none, nor will there ever be one. That ain't about to happen!

  J. J. Johnson

  Stars, War, Jurassic Park

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• I've got a collection of songs that I've had, I keep adding to and they're all great American composers. I wanted to showcase American composers and I've done that on a lot of my records and played things by American composers that I really respect.

  Charlie Haden

  Song, Done, Records

  "Charlie Haden Remembers Tomorrow". Interview With Mike Brannon, www.allaboutjazz.com. March 7, 2003.

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• Composers dialogue - and obsessively, bitterly argue - with other composers, often over the span of several centuries.

  Brian Ferneyhough

  Arguing, Century, Dialogue

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• The Russian composers, especially, tricked the symphony orchestra into the kind of dynamic, rhythmic thing

  Gerry Mulligan

  Symphony, Orchestra, Kind

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• Composers are not all good conductors.

  Anton Seidl

  Conductor

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• A characteristic of older folksongs, in most cases, is that we don't know their composers or authors. Older folksongs were written often with no commercial purpose in mind. They were passed down by word of mouth, from generation to generation.

  Tom Glazer

  Mind, Generations, Purpose

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• The composers could no longer direct all performances in person, and so the responsibility of interpreting their works in the spirit in which they had been conceived was placed upon conductors.

  Anton Seidl

  Responsibility, Spirit, Performances

  Anton Seidl (2014). “On Conducting”, p.100, Parrot Press

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• Today each composer is not only involved in aesthetics, but he's actually trying to create his own language.

  Leo Ornstein

  Trying, Today, Language

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• A hundred years ago, of course, the question that the German Composers' Co-operative asked itself sounded a lot more fundamental: How do you create a fair share for those who ensure that works can actually be performed at all?

  Johannes Rau

  Years, Fundamentals, Share

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• What inspires me is not so much the music as the opportunity to interact with composers. I think that has driven everything I've done.

  Robert Moog

  Opportunity, Thinking, Inspire

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• When you have great songs that are going to live longer than the composers, everything you can do to bring those different elements and nuances out, serve the song

  Michael Bolton

  Song, Different, Elements

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