To play without passion is inexcusable!

Let us read, and let us dance; these two amusements will never do any harm to the world.

Once you become predictable, no one's interested anymore.

The spoken form is in fact a very restrained representation of what is possible in the musical language.

Adding sound to movies would be like putting lipstick on the Venus de Milo.

The art of art, the glory of expression and the sunshine of the light of letters, is simplicity.

I accept chaos, I'm not sure whether it accepts me.

After silence, that which comes nearest to expressing the inexpressible is music.

Music was my refuge. I could crawl into the space between the notes and curl my back to loneliness.

Intellectual passion drives out sensuality.

Music in the soul can be heard by the universe.

Real popular culture is folk art - coalminers' songs and so forth.

Art is permitted to survive only if it renounces the right to be different, and integrates itself into the omnipotent realm of the profane.

Music with dinner is an insult, both to the cook and the violinist.

The music industry can make you feel like a prostitute.

We all know that art is not truth. Art is a lie that makes us realize the truth.

Every day brings a chance for you to draw in a breath, kick off your shoes, and dance.

I can't listen to that much Wagner. I start getting the urge to conquer Poland.

Painting is poetry that is seen rather than felt, and poetry is painting that is felt rather than seen.

Poets and heroes are of the same race, the latter do what the former conceive.

Each song is a child I nourish and give my love to. But even if you have never written a song, your life is a song. How can it not be?