Never look at the trombones, you'll just encourage them.

I may not be a first-rate composer, but I am a first-class second-rate composer.

The human voice is the most beautiful instrument of all, but the most difficult to play.

I want to be able to depict in music a glass of beer so accurately that every listener can tell whether it is a Pilsner or a Kulmbacher.

I shall never be converted, and I shall remain true to my old religion of the classics until my life's end.

Ideas, like young wine, should be put in storage and taken up again only after they have been allowed to ferment and to ripen.

Its a funny thing Alice, dying is just the way I composed it in Tod und Verklärung.

On conducting: If you can just barely hear the French horns on stage, the balance is perfect.

If you think that the brass is not blowing loud enough, mute it by a couple of degrees.

Never look at the brass - it only encourages them.

Must one become seventy years old to recognize that one's greatest strength lies in creating musical kitsch?

He is cured by faith who is sick of fate.

I like the silent church before the service begins, better than any preaching.

Truly, it is in loss that we learn a thing's true value.

You happened to me, " she told him, her voice more fatigued than embittered. "You came out of a grubby sixth-rate farm on a tenth-rate planet, and destroyed my life." - Mara Jade

I HAVE NOTHING TO GIVE OR RECEIVE EXCEPT UNCONDITIONAL LOVE.NOTHING COMES IN AND NOTHING GOES OUT EXCEPT UNCONDITIONAL LOVE.

The future? Like unwritten books and unborn children, you don't talk about it.

But, though persecuting malice raged, yet the Gospel shone with resplendent brightness; and, firm as an impregnable rock, withstood the attacks of its boisterous enemies with success.

We're becoming slaves to our social networks - and that's not a bad thing. You like your favorite networks, so do you friends, and pretty soon you have market winners.

Expression is never helped by suppression.

I want longevity. I don't want to be a flash in the pan. I want to continue to do good work and projects that inspire me, and if I can have fun while doing it, that's the dream.