I don't know what will become of this piece. Our brave critics will no doubt charge me with imitating Ravel's Bolero. Too bad - this is how I hear war.

When a man is in despair, it means that he still believes in something.

Real music is always revolutionary, for it cements the ranks of the people; it arouses them and leads them onward.

If they cut off both hands, I will compose music anyway holding the pen in my teeth.

I write music, it’s performed. After all, my music says it all. It doesn’t need historical and hysterical commentaries. In the long run, any words about music are less important than the music.

A creative artist works on his next composition because he was not satisfied with his previous one.

In the long run, any words about music are less important than the music.

What you have in your head, put down on paper. The head is a fragile vessel.

I feel eternal pain for those who were killed by Hitler, but I feel no less pain for those killed on Stalin's orders. I suffer for everyone who was tortured, shot, or starved to death.

It's about the people, who have stopped believing because the cup of evil has run over.

The most uninteresting part of the biography of a composer is his childhood. All those preludes are the same and the reader hurries on to the fugue.

I half-expect to check out, but I'm really there for it. It's not like at the dance, angry and forced. It's terrible in its gentleness and he's just wasting it on me.

The rich that are rejoicing having conquered life, should beware & rethink, for no man can conquer death.

We only have so much time.... Time will kill you – it really will.

My No. 1 priority, and it always has been this, is keeping our team together and making sure we have the right guys in the right positions to make a run at this for a long time.

The best reason to pray is that God is really there. In praying our unbelief starts to melt. God moves smack into the middle of even an ordinary day.

There is one sure way of telling when politicians aren't telling the truth - their lips move.

The problem is that we let special-occasion food become everyday food. That goes for soda and french fries.

If I'd had a great level of success early on, who knows how I would have responded. I might have been a complete jerk.

I think, as a writer, I'm in my own head.

Never ask what sort of computer a guy drives. If he's a Mac user, he'll tell you. If not, why embarrass him?