If I felt that one of my operas did not come off I would certainly say so.

It seems to me opera is just as relevant as an expressive art as anything else.

We think the Puritans always dressed in black and white, which they didn't. They loved very bright colors. And there were other differences in perceptions that gave one a very different view of them.

Our most intimate contact with civilizations long since dust has been through the art which has survived them.

I found a certain kind of music congenial to me; it never occurred to me to write music that was academically acceptable.

The story of Willie Stark fascinated me because it was tackling the story of a man who outwardly has all the success one could possibly want and who is destroyed by his personal demons.

Most of the important composers in our country are clustered in the Northeast.

If something is successful with the audience, it's automatically suspect; the reverse is to say that not to reach audiences is the greatest compliment an artist can receive!

There is something inherent in our democracy that tends to want to level. America is a little uncomfortable in the presence of someone who is distinctly superior in whatever way.

What is American music? The most satisfying answer I've come across is that it was a kind of natural comfort with the vernacular which is diverse and regional; it's not one particular set of sounds.

If an American audience is given a serious musical theater piece that is well produced, dramatically gripping and wonderfully acted, they'll respond to it.

The human feelings, which had never been very deep in him, grew shallower every hour, and every day something more dropped away from the decrepit wreck.

you have to live by fighting each other, it's the law, the only way that things areworth while but it hurts

All my life, the library has always been one of my favorite places to go. (Larry Brown: A Writer's Life by Jean W. Cash)

In Maine we have a saying that there's no point in speaking unless you can improve on silence.

Listen more to the other players on the bandstand than you do to yourself.

Encourage innovation. Change is our lifeblood, stagnation our death knell.

Happiness doesn't require laughter, only well-being and a sense that the world is breaking someone else's heart, not mine.

Start early – the sooner you start, the more you will have in your account when you retire. I actually waited until 30 before contributing…that was a big mistake.

At somewhere around 10 syllables, the English poetic line is at its most relaxed and manageable.

The federal government is acknowledged by all to be one of enumerated powers. The principle, that it can exercise only the powers granted to it . . . is now universally admitted.