Music
A verbal art like poetry is reflective; it stops to think. Music is immediate, it goes on to become. ~W. H. AUDEN
After silence, that which comes nearest to expressing the inexpressible is music. ~ALDOUS HUXLEY
All things move in music and write it. ~JOHN MUIR
Bach opens a vista to the universe. After experiencing him, people feel there is meaning to life after all. ~HELMUT WALCHA
To have read the greatest works of any great poet, to have beheld or heard the greatest works of any great painter or musician, is a possession added to the best things of life. ~ALGERNON CHARLES SWINBURNE
Everything he touches turns to music. ~ROBERT SCHUMANN [of Schubert]
Had I learned to fiddle, I should have done nothing else. ~SAMUEL JOHNSON
I adore art... when I am alone with my notes, my heart pounds and the tears stream from my eyes, and my emotion and my joys are too much to bear. ~GIUSEPPE VERDI
I have my own particular sorrows, loves, delights; and you have yours. But sorrow, gladness, yearning, hope, love, belong to all of us, in all times and in all places. Music is the only means whereby we feel these emotions in their universality. ~H. A. OVERSTREET
I haven't understood a bar of music in my life, but I have felt it. ~IGOR STRAVINSKY
I know only two tunes: one of them is 'Yankee Doodle' and the other one isn't. ~ULYSSES S. GRANT
I know that the twelve notes in each octave and the varieties of rhythm offer me opportunities that all of human genius will never exhaust. ~IGOR STRAVINSKY
I would say that music is the easiest means in which to express... but since words are my talent, I must try to express clumsily in words what the pure music would have done better. ~WILLIAM FAULKNER
If music be the food of love, play on. ~WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE
I'll play it first and tell you what it is later. ~MILES DAVIS
In music one must think with the heart and feel with the brain. ~GEORGE SZELL
I've never heard such corny lyrics, such simpering sentimentality, such repetitious, uninspired melody. Man, we've got a hit on our hands! ~BRAD ANDERSON
Music above all, and for this choose the irregular. ~VERLAINE
Music finds its way where the rays of the sun cannot penetrate. ~SOREN KIERKEGAARD, Either/Or, VOL. I: DIAPSALMATA
Music has charms to soothe a savage breast, to soften rocks, or bend a knotted oak. ~WILLIAM CONGREVE
Music is a universal language. Where speech fails, then music begins. It is the natural medium for the expression of our emotions--the art that expresses in tones our feelings which are too strong and deep to be expressed in words. ~CHARLES W. LANDON
Music is, after silence, that which comes nearest to expressing the inexpressible. ~ALDOUS HUXLEY
Music is moonlight in the gloomy night of life. ~JEAN PAUL RICHTER
Music is the universal language of mankind--poetry their universal pastime and delight. ~HENRY WADSWORTH LONGFELLOW
Music is the vernacular of the human soul. ~GEOFFREY LATHAM
Music is well said to be the speech of angels; in fact, nothing among the utterances allowed to man is felt to be so divine. It brings us near to the Infinite. ~THOMAS CARLYLE
Music is your own experience, your own thoughts, your wisdom. If you don't live it, it won't come out of your horn. They teach you there's a boundary line to music. But, man, there's not a boundary line to art. ~CHARLIE PARKER
Music, not being made up of objects nor referring to objects, is intangible and ineffable; it can only be, as it were, inhaled by the spirit: the rest is silence. ~JAQUES BARZUN
Music owes as much to Bach as religion to its founder. ~ROBERT SCHUMANN
Music... the favorite passion of my soul. ~THOMAS JEFFERSON
Music, the greatest good that mortals know,
And all of heaven we have below. ~JOSEPH ADDISON
Music washes away from the soul the dust of everyday life. ~BERTHOLD AUERBACH
Such sweet compulsion doth in music lie. ~JOHN MILTON
Telling his class that a critic had called him a second Beethoven, Anton Bruckner said, "How can anybody dare to say such a thing!"
The Devil does not stay where music is. ~MARTIN LUTHER
The end of all good music is to affect the soul. ~CLAUDIO MONTEVERDI
The heart of the melody can never be put on paper. ~PABLO CASALS
The key to the mystery of a great artist is that for reasons unknown, he will give away his energies and his life just to make sure that one note follows another... and leaves us with the feeling that something is right in the world. ~LEONARD BERNSTEIN
The notes I handle no better than many pianists. But the pauses between the notes--oh, that is where the art resides! ~ARTUR SCHNABEL
The trouble with music appreciation in general is that people are taught to have too much respect for music; they should be taught to love it instead. ~IGOR STRAVINSKY
There is something very wonderful in music. Words are wonderful enough; but music is even more wonderful. It speaks not to our thoughts as words do; it speaks straight to our hearts and spirits, to the very core and root of our souls. Music soothes us, stirs us up; it puts noble feelings in us; it melts us to tears; we know not how; it is a language by itself, just as perfect, in its own way, as speech, as words; just as divine, just as blessed. ~CHARLES KINGSLEY
There's nothing remarkable about it. All one has to do is hit the right keys at the right time and the instrument plays itself. ~JOHANN SEBASTIAN BACH
To have read the greatest works of any great poet, to have beheld or heard the greatest works of any great painter or musician, is a possession added to the best things of life. ~ALGERNON CHARLES SWINBURNE
Truly there would be a reason to go mad were it not for music. ~TCHAIKOVSKY
Unhappy artist pair, do you know that these tones are an eptiome of all the glories in the world? (about the song of a few poor street musicians) ~SOREN KIERKEGAARD, Either/Or, VOL. I: DIAPSALMATA
When we separate music from life we get art. ~JOHN CAGE
When words leave off, music begins. ~HEINRICH HEINE
Without music life would be a mistake. ~FRIEDRICH NIETZSCHE
Words are the pen of the heart, but music is the pen of the soul. ~SHNEUR ZALMAN