What gives the artist real prestige is his imitators.

I have learned throughout my life as a composer chiefly through my mistakes and pursuits of false assumptions, not by my exposure to founts of wisdom and knowledge.

I haven't understood a bar of music in my life, but I have felt it.

One has a nose. The nose scents and it chooses. An artist is simply a kind of pig snouting truffles.

My God, so much I like to drink Scotch that sometimes I think my name is Igor Stra-whiskey.

Art is the opposite of chaos. Art is organized chaos.

Why is it that whenever I hear a piece of music I don't like, it's always by Villa Lobos?

Film music should have the same relationship to the film drama that somebody's piano playing in my living room has on the book I am reading.

A good composer does not imitate; he steals.

In order to create there must be a dynamic force, and what force is more potent than love?

I take no pride in my artistic talents; they are God-given and I see absolutely no reason to become puffed up over something that one has received.

Love is life and life is Love

Just imagine that you are the person you want to be.

I don't know if my songs fit in films.

I have represented people in book deals.

Shared laughter creates a bond of friendship.

My dad read the Bible ten times, and I want to do it in my lifetime. But it's definitely tough getting through.

Two things I ain't ever seen, a U.F.O. and a hoe that won't go.

All your knowledge is dust. Knowing is your purity, knowledge is dust.

Willingness to learn is the mark of a youthful mind.

Because ideas have to be original only with regard to their adaptation to the problem at hand, I am always extremely interested in how others have used used them.