Tchaikovsky Quotes

Until I was around 12 or 13, I only listened to classical music, mostly Tchaikovsky. But around that age, I started listening to Iron Maiden, and that's when I purchased my first guitar, a pearl-white Westone.

[Peter] Tchaikovsky's "1812 Overture" was my first go-to song in terms of getting into the zone and getting ready and then I quickly gravitated to rock and roll music in the mid-'60s with the Grateful Dead, Bob Dylan, Neil Young, The Beatles, Crosby, Stills & Nash, The Rolling Stones, Carlos Santana. So many of them are still around and still going strong. I go out to see them all the time.

The only winner in the War of 1812 was Tchaikovsky.

The Rhapsody is not a composition at all. It's a string of separate paragraphs stuck together - with a thin paste of flour and water... I don't think there has been such an inspired melodist on this earth since Tchaikovsky... but if you want to speak of a composer, that's another matter.

Tchaikovsky’s Violin Concerto gives us for the first time the hideous notion that there can be music that stinks to the ear.

My whole trick is to keep the tune well out in front. If I play Tchaikovsky, I play his melodies and skip his spiritual struggle.

When I was young, Tchaikovsky was ruined for me by conductors who made it slick and treacly. Hearing Valery Gergiev conduct Tchaikovsky has been a revelation - he brings out all its raw passion. And Gergiev with the super-virtuoso LSO - well, it's just the perfect combination.

Those who were still able to write beautiful melodies were kitsch composers like Tchaikovsky. Tchaikovsky approaches true art not in his numerous beautiful melodies, but when a melodic line is thwarted.

He believed that life, true life, was something that was stored in music. True life was kept safe in the lines of Tchaikovsky's Eugene Onegin while you went out in the world and met the obligations required of you. Certainly he knew (though did not completely understand) that opera wasn't for everyone, but for everyone he hoped there was something. The records he cherished, the rare opportunities to see a live performance, those were the marks by which he gauged his ability to love.

If they can learn to say Tchaikovsky and Michelangelo and Dostoyevsky, they can learn to say Uzoamaka.

Dance of the Sugar Plum Bikey. Yes, that's got a nice ring to it.

'Swan Lake' was my favourite piece of music when I was younger, and I never had a chance to skate to it.

The trick with 'Nutcracker' was figure out how much, and where, we could the Tchaikovsky - using as much as we possibly could and still support the storytelling.

We do a lot of light classical programming with that, too... obviously... a lot of Tchaikovsky music, Grieg, things like that which have become less classical with classical concerts.

The radio station was playing Tchaikovsky's Swan Lake, a sure sign that things were much worse than they appeared.

I love anything by Tchaikovsky. He was the real pop star of his day.

Deep down, classical Romantic music is what I love: Brahms, Tchaikovsky, the Romantics.

I remember him reading 'Sleeping Beauty,' and he would play the score by Tchaikovsky as he read it. We'd also read 'Winnie the Pooh,' and, you know, those probably that he most often read me were 'Beatrix Potter' books, 'The Tale of Jemima Puddle-Duck' and 'The Tale of Mrs. Tiggy-Winkle.' I still have at least 15 of them.

The beginning of Book Three is the last one that I drew, where V's conducting the 1812 overture.

A friend gave me a CD of the 'Pathetique' Symphony as a Christmas present. I went home, and I put on the CD expecting to listen to Tchaikovsky. But it started 'ta ta ta taaa.' It was too long for me. I didn't understand it at first, but then I fell in love, in love, in love.

They say that Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky was a homosexual. Truth be told, we don't love him because of that, but he was a great musician, and we all love his music. So what? I assure you that I work with these people. I sometimes award them with state prizes or decorations for their achievements in various fields. We have absolutely normal relations, and I don't see anything out of the ordinary here.

Now I love hoops. I'm a diehard UCLA fan, have been since my freshman year. But basketball is the '1812 Overture.' Pomp and circumstance, fireworks and cannons, lots and lots of fun, and in the end, still Tchaikovsky.

Tchaikovsky was one of the great melody writers of all time.

I listed to Tchaikovsky. He is both kitsch and profound. I love that lack of "Good taste."

When December comes, can 'The Nutcracker' be far behind? No, it can't - not in America, anyway.