The most perfect expression of human behavior is a string quartet.

Basically speaking, conducting is quite a healthy profession.

I was told when I went for a life-insurance exam when I was 18 that I was not likely to live past 50, so I refused to pay the premium.

So I observe life a little bit, rather than participating in it.

I guess, as a conductor, one goes in and out of fashion. Your career starts with a bang, everyone thinks you're wonderful, and then with middle age, something happens and you go into the wilderness.

I had a sense of debt to the medical profession and to surgery particularly. I would not be as ambient as I am without it.

You have been “self-pitying” for long years now and things don’t seem to improve. Just try a few days of good self-esteeming” and you’ll see things taking a better shape!

I won’t lie. I want to beat the hell out of any man who’s had you—you’d be smart to keep them the hell away from me—but nothing in your past can change how I feel about you.

I have spent my life judging the distance between American reality and the American dream.

Prayer begets Revival, which begets more prayer.

Make your race a playground, not a proving ground.

It occurs to me that for a long time she has been doing her own version of resisting.

Calum offered to paint my nails but I said no because he always uses the wrong shade of purple.

You've got to learn to leave the table When love's no longer being served".

To be spiritually dead is to be diabolically alive

No one wants to stay in the tabloids. But it's actually not a terrible place to start.