Wagner has lovely moments but awful quarters of an hour.

Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart is the only musician who had as much knowledge asgenius, and as much genius as knowledge.

Beethoven I take twice a week, Haydn four times, and Mozart every day.

Wagner has lovely moments but awful quarters of an hour.

Answer them critics with silence and indifference. It works better, I assure you, than anger and argument. . . .

Nothing primes inspiration more than necessity, whether it be the presence of a copyist waiting for your work or the prodding of an impresario tearing his hair.

One can't judge Wagner's opera Lohengrin after a first hearing, and I certainly don't intend to hear it a second time.