If men of genius only knew what love their works inspire!

Every composer knows the anguish and despair occasioned by forgetting ideas which one had no time to write down.

It is not enough that the artist should be well prepared for the public. The public must be well prepared for what it is going to hear.

Time is a great teacher, but unfortunately it kills all its pupils.

Heine commenting on the music of Louis Hector Berlioz: He is an immense nightingale, a lark as great as an eagle. . . . The music causes me to dream of fabulous empires, filled with fabulous sins.

Bach is Bach just as God is God.

At least I have the modesty to admit that lack of modesty is one of my failings.