Write over improviseIf Heaven has bestowed on you a fine imagination, you will often be seated at your piano in solitary hours, as if attached to it; you will desire to express the feelings of your heart in harmony, and the more clouded the sphere of harmony may perhaps be to you, the more mysteriously you will […]
Richter on Bach“It does no harm to listen to Bach from time to time, even if only from a hygienic standpoint.” – Sviatoslav Richter, pianist Monsaingeon, Bruno (2001). Sviatoslav Richter: Notebooks and Conversations. Princeton University Press, p.196. Cited at: Wikipedia
Practising an artPractising an art, no matter how well or badly, is a way to make your soul grow, for heaven’s sake. Sing in the shower. Dance to the radio. Tell stories. Write a poem to a friend, even a lousy poem. Do it as well as you possibly can. You will get an enormous reward. You […]
The art of listening“It’s a challenge, for me at least, to do nothing but listen. You need to set aside time for it. You need to concentrate on the music alone (and not on your next deadline). But when it works, you open yourself up to the transcendent ecstasy good music can bring.” Francis Merson, editor, Limelight, April […]
Language at its most powerfulLanguage is at its most powerful when it disturbs, not by arriving at insights/understandings, but by creating possibilities. – Thomas Ogden T. Ogden, Reveries and Interpretations: Sensing Something Human, Lanham, Roman & Littlefield, 2004, p. 219.
Schumann chasing a girlSchumann once attended a masquerade during the carnival of 1830, in company with his friend Rosen, for the purpose of paying some attention to a pretty but otherwise insignificant girl.He knew that she would be present at the ball, and, as a pretext for approaching her, put a poem in his pocket.Fortune favored him: he […]
The progress of an artistWhat happens is a continual surrender of himself as he is at the moment to something which is more valuable. The progress of an artist is a continual self-sacrifice, a continual extinction of personality. – T. S. Elliot, Tradition and the Individual Talent (1919)
Saint-Saëns on the art of musicThe artist who does not feel completely satisfied by elegant lines, by harmonious colours, and by a beautiful succession of chords does not understand the art of music. — Camille Saint-Saëns Cited in Milton Cross David Ewan, Encyclopedia of Great Composers and Their Music, volume 2. Double Day, 1969, p.819.
Perseverance“Edison failed 10, 000 times before he made the electric light. Do not be discouraged if you fail a few times.” – Napoleon Hill, American author
I write for all earsWhen Mozart was writing his opera Idomeno, his father warned him to make sure it was accessible to all the audience. Mozart replied: As far as the so-called Popular style is concerned, don’t worry about it; in my Opera you’ll find Musick for every kind of listener = except for those with the long ears […]
