No nation as young as America can be expected to become immediately a power in the arts.

American teachers have one indisputable advantage over foreign ones; they understand the American temperament and can judge its unevenness, its lights and its shadows.

My success is not due to any personal superiority over other people.

I have always believed that 98% of a student's progress is due to his own efforts, and 2% to his teacher.

Anybody can write music of a sort. But touching the public heart is quite another thing.

The office of President is a great one; to every true American it seems the greatest on earth. And to me, as I was engaged in weaving a background of music for the pageantry of it, there came a deeper realization of the effect of that office on the man.

To the average mind popular music would mean compositions vulgarly conceived and commonplace in their treatment. That is absolutely false.