Through music time is tamed, although music never forgets to remind us of time's faceless mission.

To master the piano is to master the universe.

A work of art expresses itself as a balance sheet pitting the spoken against the unspoken.

The breath, prayers, and libido of the fingertip must somehow be transferred to the neutral indifference of the key.

As Bartok put it so succinctly: "Competitions are for horses." Nothing could be more barbaric that the practice or ranking artists as though they were divers or figure skaters....What one suspects is that the appetite for dividing the world into winners and losers, anointed and anonymous, is so compulsive that it feeds with special, vindictive hunger on the most elusive and ephemeral of subjects. For if music can be reduced to games of power and success, then innocence-love without profit-can be dealt a crushing blow.

Through music time is tamed, although music never forgets to remind us of time's faceless mission.

The context for music is varied and profound. If their fantasy is to be awakened-so that their sounds may be incisive or ravishing-then the menagerie of saints and dragons must be faithfully recalled.