I have put my whole soul into this work [The Pathetique Symphony] . . . You cannot imagine what joy I feel at the thought that my days are not yet over and that I may still accomplish much.

Madam, you ask me how I compose. I compose sitting down.

Brahms stayed an extra day to hear my [Fifth] Symphony and was very kind ... I like his honesty and open-mindedness. Neither he nor the players liked the finale, which I also think rather horrible.

To regret the past, to hope in the future, and never to be satisfied with the present: that is what I spend my whole life doing

Sometimes I observe with curiosity that uninterrupted activity which, independent of the subject of any conversation I may be carrying on, continues its course in that department of my brain that is devoted to music.

The creative process is like music which takes root with extraordinary force and rapidity

Music is an incomparably more powerful means and is a subtler language for expressing the thousand different moments of the soul's moods.