Igor Stravinsky Quotes

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

What gives the artist real prestige is his imitators.

Too many pieces of music finish too long after the end.

To listen is an effort, and just to hear is no merit. A duck hears also.

The trouble with music appreciation in general is that people are taught to have too much respect for music they should be taught to love it instead.

The real composer thinks about his work the whole time; he is not always conscious of this, but he is aware of it later when he suddenly knows what he will do.

The principle of the endless melody is the perpetual becoming of a music that never had any reason for starting, any more than it has any reason for ending.

The more constraints one imposes, the more one frees one’s self. And the arbitrariness of the constraint serves only to obtain precision of execution.

The Church knew what the psalmist knew: Music praises God. Music is well or better able to praise him than the building of the church and all its decoration; it is the Church’s greatest ornament.

Sins cannot be undone, only forgiven.

My music is best understood by children and animals.

Music is given to us with the sole purpose of establishing an order in things, including, and particularly, the coordination between man and time.

Money may kindle, but it cannot by itself, and for very long, burn.

Just as appetite comes by eating, so work brings inspiration, if inspiration is not discernible at the beginning.

Is it not by love alone that we succeed in penetrating to the very essence of being?

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

I was born out of due time in the sense that by temperament and talent I should have been more suited for the life of a small Bach, living in anonymity and composing regularly for an established service and for God.