I listened more than I studied... therefore little by little my knowledge and ability were developed.

When I think of my God, my heart dances within me for joy, and then my music has to dance, too.

Young people can learn from my example that something can come from nothing. What I have become is the result of my hard efforts.

There was no one near to confuse me, so I was forced to become original.

Since God has given me a cheerful heart, He will forgive me for serving Him cheerfully.

It is the melody which is the charm of music, and it is that which is most difficult to produce. The invention of a fine melody is a work of genius.

When I think upon my God, my heart is full of joy that the notes dance and leap from my pen.

I was never a quick writer, but composed with great care and efforts.

If you want to know whether you have written anything worth preserving, sing it to yourself without any accompaniment.

I'm going to commune with God and I must be appropriately dressed!

I tell you before God, and as an honest man, your son (W A Mozart)is the greatest composer known to me by person and repute, he has taste and what is more the greatest skill in composition.

Rachmaninoff. The 18th Variation of a Rhapsody on a Theme of Paganini.

What's the point of all this magic, if no one really knows how to use it? But I guess the same could be said about life. Which is another form of magic, only less showy.

How can you fall in love at first sight when you can't even see?

All good work has magic in it, and addresses the mind in a subtle way.

By heaven you have destroyed me, my friends!

There are three things I always forget. Names, faces and... the third I can't remember.

When one does nothing, one believes oneself responsible for everything.

I think a shotgun or a handgun that has a six-round clip is a very good, perfectly adequate weapon for self-defense, in the home. You simply can't create that kind of mayhem, if you have to reload.

I think people have problems sometimes when things are too general. In fact, they are not really general at all.

In actual fact, I have been an academic - a college and university teacher and scholar - for much of the last 45 years, and only rarely a writer.