How wonderful opera would be if there were no singers.
If Beethoven is a prodigy of man, Bach is a miracle of God.
Answer them critics with silence and indifference. It works better, I assure you, than anger and argument. . . .
Every kind of music is good, except the boring kind.
Music is a kind of harmonious language.
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.