Ultimately, music is a possessive mistress.

How could a New Yorker possibly take something called the Hollywood String Quartet seriously?

The role of an orchestra in the 21st century isn't just playing, it's about developing future audiences and performers.

We need music to restore the human spirit

I use my hands like a sculptor, to mold and shape the sound I want, to clarify.

The convergence of the Rhone and Saone. Paul Bocuse. The birthplace of cinema. Chateauneuf-du-Pape just a few miles down the road. It does not get much better than Lyon.

An orchestra knows during the first two minutes of the first rehearsal whether or not they are going to enjoy the person on the podium.

There is no 'perfect' in music. If I ever came off the stage and felt it could not be better, it would then be time to quit.

We are a global society, and one does not have to be from Germany to give a great performance of Beethoven.

I don't really think about retiring. I will retire just before people start saying, 'I knew Leonard Slatkin when he conducted well.

Over the years it has been my privilege to lead performances with Saint Louis, the National Symphony, Cleveland Orchestra and so many other wonderful organizations.

No one taught us how to address our impulses. No one.

Art is not about thinking something up. It is the opposite -- getting something down.

In the furnace of fire, gold and silver are refined.In the furnace of affliction, we are refined and purified.

Some express, some write and some just feel it.

Sometimes, you have to make the choice to forgive 10 times a day when you have these pockets of anger come up. That's a lot of work, but to me it's worthwhile.

I like to go out and write. So I'll often go to a Starbucks or a local coffee bar, and I'll sit there and I'll write. I can write pretty much anywhere.

He was trying to tell me something.' Derek snorted. 'Aren’t they all? Must be a rule in the ghost handbook—if in danger of evaporating, make sure you’re in the middle of a dire pronouncement.

Recipes are just descriptions of one person’s take on one moment in time. They’re not rules.

Everyone has a 'risk muscle.' You keep it in shape by trying new things. If you don't, it atrophies. Make a point of using it at least once a day.

Until a character becomes a personality it cannot be believed.