The most difficult instrument to play in the orchestra is second fiddle.

The second fiddle. I can get plenty of first violinists, but to find someone who can play the second fiddle with enthusiasm

I believe in people. I feel, love, need and respect people above all else, including natural scenery, organized piety and nationalistic superstructures. One human figure on the slope of a mountain can make the mountain disappear for me, one person fighting for truth can disqualify for me the entire system which had dispensed it.

I'm no longer quite sure what the question is, but I do know that the answer is Yes.

From New Year's on the outlook brightens; good humor lost in a mood of failure returns. I resolve to stop complaining.

Music, of all the arts, stands in a special region, unlit by any star but its own, and utterly without meaning ... except its own.

What [Louis Armstrong] does is real, and true, and honest, and simple, and even noble. Every time this man puts his trumpet to his lips, even if only to practice three notes, he does it with his whole soul.