Heine commenting on the music of Louis Hector Berlioz: He is an immense nightingale, a lark as great as an eagle. . . . The music causes me to dream of fabulous empires, filled with fabulous sins.

Time is a great teacher, but unfortunately it kills all its pupils.

Music and love are the wings of the soul.

Love cannot express the idea of music, while music may give an idea of love

It is not enough that the artist should be well prepared for the public. The public must be well prepared for what it is going to hear.

To render my works properly requires a combination of extreme precision and irresistible verve, a regulated vehemence, a dreamy tenderness, and an almost morbid melancholy.

The luck of having talent is not enough; one must also have a talent for luck.

Every composer knows the anguish and despair occasioned by forgetting ideas which one had no time to write down.

At least I have the modesty to admit that lack of modesty is one of my failings.

Only by pairing knowledge with inspiration will art evolve. Without these conditions any musician will remain a flawed artist, if one may speak of an artist at all.

Bach is Bach just as God is God.

La verdad, es que en el fondo soy un fatalista. Si a uno le llega la hora, da lo mismo un Boeing que la puntual maceta que se derrumba sobre uno desde un séptimo piso

Life consists of books.

As long as the belief is: we need suffering to grow, the world will be suffering and the belief will be limiting.

Grass that is here today and gone tomorrow does not require much time to mature. A giant oak tree that lasts for generations requires much more time to grow strong.

The more independent you want to be, the more generous you must be with yourself as a woman.

There are far too many men in politics and not enough elsewhere.

One we discover how to appreciate the timeless values in our daily experiences, we can enjoy the best things in life.

One can live magnificently in this world if one knows how to work and how to love.

I've been performing since the 60s and I made my first album in 1969, so it's been a bit over twenty years.

It is not from ourselves that we learn to be better than we are.