Don't only practise your art, but force your way into its secrets.

An artist is someone who has learned to trust in himself.

The guitar is an orchestra in itself.

I want to seize fate by the throat.

Beethoven can write music, thank God, but he can do nothing else on earth.

Music is the mediator between the spiritual and the sensual life. Although the spirit be not master of that which it creates through music, yet it is blessed in this creation, which, like every creation of art, is mightier than the artist.

I change many things, discard others, and try again and again until I am satisfied; then, in my head, I being to elaborate the work in its breadth, its narrowness, its height, its depth...I hear and see the image in front of me from every angle as if it had been cast and only the labour of writing it down remains.