Thomas Jefferson Quotes

Seriously though, my father was the first African American to sign a contract with the Metropolitan Opera so I grew up with classical music and jazz in the home all the time.

Music is a continuum and the modern and avant-garde composers of today will be part of the standard repertoire 30 years from now.

The climate suits me, and London has the greatest serious music that you can hear any day of the week in the world - you think it's going to be Vienna or Paris or somewhere, but if you go to Vienna or Paris and say, 'Let's hear some good music', there isn't any.

Do you think Duke Ellington didn't listen to Debussy? Louis Armstrong loved opera, did you know that? Name me a jazz pianist who wasn't influenced by European music!

A cello was there 400 years ago and will still be here in 400 years.

Classical music has been based on works people love and come back to for aural comfort.

Music and opera are a big part of my life.

I think the Mormon Tabernacle Choir is as great as it is because it's become it's a labor of love. They love what they do.

The Chicago Symphony is considered the greatest orchestra in the world.

When I hear that young people have come to the theater for the first time to listen to opera, I'm very happy. Because it's the same thing that happened to me as a child. When I first heard the tenor voice, I immediately fell in love with this kind of music.

I was born out of classical music.

The thing about influence is that any composer worth anything will give you the same names.

It's hard to find an emblem of cultural, national pride that burns as bright as Israel's success in classical music.

A lot of people may not know how competitive it is to play classical music, because when you think about it, the music that you're playing is music that's been here for years. And all you're trying to do is improve upon it when you play.

I basically love classical music. I love a lot of musicians playing together and the whole culture of that, whether it's Indian or it's Western.

Most of the important composers in our country are clustered in the Northeast.

The classical music scene was completely unfamiliar to me. It was something that I didn't have the most fun associations around. A lot of people don't - they think of older generations and stuffiness. But it's not. You listen to the Overture of 1812, and you can hear a rock n' roll catharsis.

New music is absolutely integral to classical music.

I love traditional music. But in any culture around the world, there is the historic and cultural music and everything that's been passed down and passed down, and hopefully you take that, and then you take it, you know, the next distance, and then somebody else takes it the next distance.

I was just going more for what I've always been influenced by, European music.

All old music was modern once, and much more of the music of yesterday already sounds more old-fashioned than works which were written three centuries ago.

I come from a very strenuous, strict, disciplined classical music background. My grandfather, noted Carnatic classical exponent Dr. Sripada Pinakapani, was a Padma Bhushan recipient.

I'm an opera lover.

The Boston Symphony is one of the best orchestras in the world and has such a great tradition - which I want to cherish, of course, and to learn from and to continue and to add whatever I can add.

I have a history, and I am proud of my legacy as a songwriter, all of the songs that I've brought forth into our culture. I'm proud of that.