Life is denied by lack of attention, whether it be to cleaning windows or trying to write a masterpiece.

[On the music of Richard Strauss:] Too many notes!

Do nothing for effect. Do it for truth.

In music everything is prolonged, everything is edified, and when the enchantment has ceased, we are still bathed in its clarity; solitude is accompanied by a new hope between pity for ourselves - which makes us more indulgent and more understanding - and the certitude of finding something again, that which lives for ever in music.

Nothing is better than music; when it takes us out of time, it has done more for us than we have the right to hope for.

It is easier to analyze a work in its form, in its evolution, than simply to love it with all the living forces of our heart. It is easier to define its peculiarities and its details than to draw out of it its emotion, its thought.

You should never listen to someone practice. That is their work and theirs alone.