Jimi Hendrix Quotes

There's no performance where I never have to think about setting up a phrase or making a technical adjustment while I'm performing.

The soprano turned out to sound to me like the right hand on the piano.

One learns how to change gears within a concert repertoire.

With the piano I'm completely in control of the gestural situation-not that I'm going to play the piece myself, but I know what's difficult, what's impossible.

Well, rhythm is 90 percent of the interpretation.

Menuhin was playing Bach on a fantastic spiritual level when he was a teenager.

The notes I handle no better than many pianists. But the pauses between the notes ah, that is where the art resides.

The right notes mean more than 1,000 mph arpeggios.

In music, silence is more important than sound.

The conductor must breathe life into the score. It is you and you alone who must expose it to the understanding, reveal the hidden jewel to the sun at the most flattering angles.

When you have great songs that are going to live longer than the composers, everything you can do to bring those different elements and nuances out, serve the song.

Mozart is always a bit of a challenge - you know, even though it is often given to very young singers, it is actually the most complicated to sing in many instances.

If you want me to play only the notes without any specific dynamics, I will never make one mistake.

A melody is not merely something you can hum.

There is a world of difference between a Mahler eighth note and a normal eighth note.

No one should be allowed to make music as if he were made of wood. One must reproduce the musical text exactly, but not play like a stone.

Listening is the key to everything good in music.

Very often, if I know the orchestra doesn't know a piece or it's a new piece, I have main ideas about it. But then we start to play and I never talk about places where they played so beautiful and so clear in the beginning that there is nothing to say.

Can't you read? The score demands 'con amore', and what are you doing? You are playing it like married men!

I don't think I handle the notes much differently from other pianists. But the pauses between the notes - ah, there is where the artistry lies!!

In symphonic music, when you are conducting, you do the same thing. You are feeling the whole orchestra, thinking ahead so you can prepare for a change.

Opera is musical theatre, and the music can teach you so much about the theatre. Very often I use musical terms to think about how I comport myself on stage: I employ 'rubati,' 'ostinati,' 'cadenze.' Finding these parallels is very fascinating for me.

If I'm playing a violin thing, for instance, I tend to respond to that sound with the way I finger.

Composers are the only people who can hear good music above bad sounds.

Scales played in the correct musical way are very exciting and rewarding.