Jonathan Safran Foer Quotes

People often complain that music is too ambiguous, that what they should think when they hear it is so unclear, whereas everyone understands words. With me, it is exactly the opposite, and not only with regard to an entire speech but also with individual words.

I think that's the great thing about music: It can communicate emotionally. And you don't have to necessarily get all of the words. I mean you have to know what is being said, but didn't you find even if you didn't get all of the words, you certainly get the emotion?

There, in the chords and melodies, is everything I want to say. The words just jolly it along. It's always been my way of expressing what, for me, is inexpressible by any other means.

It is music that, being the universal language, has no need to learn any particular language of the world.

You know, I think music is very interactive. It's a - it's a language.

Where words fail, music speaks.

Music is the soul of language.

I think it's a very important collaboration between the conductor and the orchestra - especially when the conductor is one more member of the orchestra in the way that you are leading, but also respecting, feeling and building the same way for all the players to understand the music.

Silence is a universal language. It's like music or painting.

Musicians are not so concerned with language.

Sure, I love people, and I want to communicate with people. I mean, what is music anyway? It's a form of communication - at least for me it is. And that's why I play the kind of music that I think - that I hope - can communicate with people.

My proposition is that music is at the heart of what 'The Magic Flute' means: that it's Mozart's music, not the words, we should be attending to. Music expresses what can't be expressed otherwise.

Music is a language.

Is it not the business of the conductor to convey to the public in its dramatic form the central idea of a composition; and how can he convey that idea successfully if he does not enter heart and soul into the life of the music and the tale it unfolds?

I'd rather let the music speak for itself.

I hear music as narrative.

Music is the universal language of mankind.

When words leave off, music begins.

Music expresses what cannot be put into words I like to think, and I think the band makes a good go at it.

In some ways I believe music is the more convincing communicator of ideas than words. For instance, we can hear of Kordaly and Bartok and recognise them as Hungarian, but very few of us speak Hungarian, but the music itself speaks to more people.

I think the whole question of meaning in music is difficult enough even if you hear me playing live right now in the same room! What I mean and what you take from it may be two quite different things anyway.

I'm the only instrument that's got the words, so I've got to be able to get that across.

Sometimes a couple notes are worth a thousand words.

I'm asking questions that most people are asking, but just putting a melody or a song to it.

My music is written with one goal in mind: to improvise. It's like explaining a great story in words, but without words, much faster than you could with words. It's like a direct line of instantaneous communication where you don't have to wait for the end.