Lesser artists borrow, great artists steal.

Sins cannot be undone, only forgiven.

The trouble with music appreciation in general is that people are taught to have too much respect for music they should be taught to love it instead.

Conductors' careers are made for the most part with 'Romantic' music. 'Classic' music eliminates the conductor; we do not remember him in it.

What force is more potent than love?

Is it not by love alone that we succeed in penetrating to the very essence of being?

I have learned throughout my life as a composer chiefly through my mistakes and pursuits of false assumptions, not by my exposure to founts of wisdom and knowledge.

I haven't understood a bar of music in my life, but I have felt it.

Too many pieces of music finish too long after the end.

Film music should have the same relationship to the film drama that somebody's piano playing in my living room has on the book I am reading.