Sooner or later you've heard all your best friends have to say. Then comes the tolerance of real love.

Arguably, no artist grows up: If he sheds the perceptions of childhood, he ceases being an artist.

Greatness is not the effect of which inspiration is the cause. We are all inspired, but we are all not great.

The Great don't innovate, they fertilize seeds planted by lackeys, they leave to others the inhaling of the flowers whose roots they've manured. A deceptive memory may be the key to their originality.

Compose first, worry later.

Bel canto is to opera what pole-vaulting is to ballet.

The same piece of music alters at each hearing. But oh, the need to repeat and repeat and repeat unchanged the sexual experience.