I had a sense of debt to the medical profession and to surgery particularly. I would not be as ambient as I am without it.

The most perfect expression of human behavior is a string quartet.

Basically speaking, conducting is quite a healthy profession.

I was told when I went for a life-insurance exam when I was 18 that I was not likely to live past 50, so I refused to pay the premium.

So I observe life a little bit, rather than participating in it.

I guess, as a conductor, one goes in and out of fashion. Your career starts with a bang, everyone thinks you're wonderful, and then with middle age, something happens and you go into the wilderness.

Education leads to enlightenment. Enlightenment opens the way to empathy. Empathy foreshadows reform.

It is interesting ... how weapons reflect the soul of the maker.

I've had boyfriends complain, "Wait, you don't want to see me?" No, I don't. I just want to hang out by myself. So screw off.

The helpless ecstasy of loosing himself in her charm was a powerful opiate rather than a tonic.

But as my voice coach keeps saying, if we actually spoke the way they imagine the Elizabethan voice might have been, we wouldn't be able to understand it.

How distant I am from people when I am with them, and how close when they are far away.

The world is nothing but change, our life is only perception.

I feel like personally I have more drive now than I did then probably because I care more and also because I've reached the mid-life point.

Let not one single life have passed in vain. What really matters is who you love and how you love.

Scarcely a tear to shed; Hardly a word to say; The end of a Summer's day; Sweet Love is dead.