A great piece of music is beautiful regardless of how it is performed. Any prelude or fugue of Bach can be played at any tempo, with or without rhythmic nuances, and it will still be great music. That's how music should be written, so that no-one, no matter how philistine, can ruin it.
Dmitri ShostakovichEvery piece of music is a form of personal expression for its creator...If a work doesnt express the composers own personal point of view, his own ideas, then it doesnt, in my opinion, even deserve to be born.
Dmitri ShostakovichMusic is a means capable of expressing dark dramatism and pure rapture, suffering and ecstasy, fiery and cold fury, melancholy and wild merriment – and the subtlest nuances and interplay of these feelings which words are powerless to express and which are unattainable in painting and sculpture.
Dmitri ShostakovichI don't know what will become of this piece. Our brave critics will no doubt charge me with imitating Ravel's Bolero. Too bad - this is how I hear war.
Dmitri ShostakovichI always try to make myself as widely understood as possible; and if I don't succeed, I consider it my own fault.
Dmitri ShostakovichReal music is always revolutionary, for it cements the ranks of the people; it arouses them and leads them onward.
Dmitri ShostakovichI write music, it’s performed. After all, my music says it all. It doesn’t need historical and hysterical commentaries. In the long run, any words about music are less important than the music.
Dmitri ShostakovichWe should think more about it, and accustom ourselves to the thought of death. We can't allow the fear of death to creep up on us unexpectedly. We have to make the fear familiar, and one way is to write about it. I don't think writing and thinking about death is characteristic only of old men. I think that if people began thinking about death sooner, they'd make fewer foolish mistakes.
Dmitri ShostakovichA creative artist works on his next composition because he was not satisfied with his previous one.
Dmitri ShostakovichThe best way to hold on to something is to pay no attention to it. The things you love too much perish. You have to treat everything with irony, especially the things you hold dear. There's more of a chance then that they'll survive.
Dmitri ShostakovichWhat can be considered human emotions? Surely not only lyricism, sadness, tragedy? Doesn't laughter also have a claim to that lofty title? I want to fight for the legitimate right of laughter in "serious" music.
Dmitri Shostakovich