Harpists spend 90 percent of their lives tuning their harps and 10 percent playing out of tune.

I never understood the need for a "live" audience. My music, because of its extreme quietude, would be happiest with a dead one.

An artist is like a pig snouting truffles.

Silence, which will save from shame, will also deprive me of fame.

The further one separates himself from the precepts of the Christian Church, the further one distances himself from the truth. Only God can create. I make music from music.

The trick is to compose what one wants to compose and to get it commissioned afterward.

My God, so much I like to drink Scotch that sometimes I think my name is Igor Stra-whiskey.