Gustav Mahler Quotes

» If a composer could say what he had to say in words he would not bother trying to say it in music.

» All that is not perfect down to the smallest detail is doomed to perish.

» An operetta is simply a small and gay opera.

» Beauty and fullness of tone can be achieved by having the whole orchestra play with high clarinets and a carefully selected number of piccolos.

» Behind me the branches of a wasted and sterile existence are cracking.

» Destiny smiles upon me but without making me the least bit happier.

» Discipline, work. Work, discipline.

» Even if people censure me, they should do so hat in hand.

» Fortunately, something always remains to be harvested. So let us not be idle.

» I also had a brother who was like me a musician and a composer. A man of great talent, far more gifted than I. He died very young... he killed himself in the prime of his life.

» I am hitting my head against the walls, but the walls are giving way.

» I beg of you... never assume an inner or an outer pose, never a disguise.

» I don't let myself get carried away by my own ideas - I abandon 19 out of 20 of them every day.

» I have become a different person. I don't know whether this person is better, he certainly is not happier.

» I hope you will no longer accuse me of a lack of delicacy. as I now count on your understanding.

» I live like a Hottentot. I cannot exchange one sensible word with anyone.

» I was a crazy young man who let himself be blinded by his passions and obeyed only the impulses of the moment.

» If I weren't the way I am, I shouldn't write my symphonies.

» In its beginnings, music was merely chamber music, meant to be listened to in a small space by a small audience.

» In the theatrical works we love and admire the most, the ending of the drama generally takes place offstage.

» It is easier to achieve a desired result in short pieces.

» It is strange how one feels drawn forward without knowing at first where one is going.

» It should be one's sole endeavor to see everything afresh and create it anew.

» It's not just a question of conquering a summit previously unknown, but of tracing, step by step, a new pathway to it.

» Melodic invention is one of the surest signs of a divine gift.

» Never let oneself be guided by the opinion of one's contemporaries. Continue steadfastly on one's way.

» Spring won't let me stay in this house any longer! I must get out and breathe the air deeply again.

» The call of love sounds very hollow among these immobile rocks.

» The further the music develops, the more complex the apparatus used by the composer to express his thoughts becomes.

» The impressions of the spriritual experiences gave my future life its form and content.

» The real art of conducting consists in transitions.

» The spirit can assert itself only through the medium of clear form.

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

» To judge a composer's work, one must consider it as a whole.

» What I wanted and what I visualized while composing has not always been realized.

» When I have reached a summit, I leave it with great reluctance, unless it is to reach for another, higher one.

» With the coming of spring, I am calm again.

» A symphony must be like the world. It must contain everything.

» If you think you're boring your audience, go slower not faster.

» Don't bother looking at the view - I have already composed it.

» You must renounce all superficiality, all convention, all vanity and delusion.

» The longer you live and the more you learn, the more clearly you will feel the difference between the few men who are truly great and the mere virtuosi.

» The point is not to take the world's opinion as a guiding star but to go one's way in life and working unerringly, neither depressed by failure nor seduced by applause.

Who Said It?

Who Said: "There is no question that we are in a period in which we are going to have to use those sources to fund about 35 million dollars a year that used to be paid for by the federal government." Click To See

Daily Famous Quote

"Never stand between a dog and the hydrant." - John Peers

Gustav Mahler Quotes

Who Said It?

Daily Famous Quote

Quotes by Author

Quotes by Topic