Whereas most other modern composers are engaged in manufacturing cocktails of every hue and description, I offer the public cold spring water.

Pay no attention to what the critics say; no statue has ever been erected to a critic.

Music begins where the possibilities of language end.

If we understood the world, we would realize that there is a logic of harmony underlying its manifold apparent dissonances.

All the doctors who wanted to forbid me to smoke and to drink are dead.

Music is, for me, like a beautiful mosaic which God has put together. He takes all the pieces in his hand, throws them into the world, and we have to recreate the picture from the pieces.

If you really put a small value upon yourself, rest assured that the world will not raise your price. Pay no attention to what the critics say. A statue has never been erected in honor of a critic.

Music is on a higher plane than everything else in this world.

I often conduct an orchestra in my sleep; my orchestras are so huge that the back desks of the violas vanish into the horizon. And everything is so wonderful.

Millions of years ago, in my previous incarnations, I must have been related to swans... because I can still feel that affinity.

The framework of a symphony must be so strong that it forces you to follow it, regardless of the environment and circumstances.

Faith is believing in something you cannot prove for certain.

The father receives his power from God (and from his own father). The teacher finds the soil already prepared for obedience, and the political leader has only to harvest what has been sown.

My question is what non-Microsoft browsers were you concerned about in January of 1996.

In Puppies Behind Bars, when the puppy is eight weeks old it is given to an inmate. The inmate is responsible for the dog.

I don't really think about the audience much. I think of myself. Let me dig myself out of that one.

A human being sheds its leaves like a tree. Sickness prunes it down; and it no longer offers the same silhouette to the eyes which loved it, to the people to whom it afforded shade and comfort.

You have the choice to create the life your heart is yearning to live.

The Bible is a human product: it tells us how our religious ancestors saw things, not how God sees things

When people meet me I think they're surprised to find out I'm not always angst-ridden.

It's fun, but the fun is where it always was. I mean, it's still fun to strap on my Les Paul in the basement and turn up the Marshall amp. I'm still 15. I still enjoy that as much as I ever did.