Musical compositions, it should be remembered, do not inhabit certain countries, certain museums, like paintings and statues. The Mozart Quintet is not shut up in Salzburg: I have it in my pocket. — Henri Rabaud
The material of music is sound and silence. Integrating these is composing. — John Cage
Composers in the old days used to keep strictly to the base of the theme, as their real subject. Beethoven varies the melody, harmony and rhythms so beautifully. — Johannes Brahms
Composing gives me great pleasure... there is nothing that surpasses the joy of creation, if only because through it one wins hours of self-forgetfulness, when one lives in a world of sound. — Clara Schumann
A composer is a guy who goes around forcing his will on unsuspecting air molecules, often with the assistance of unsuspecting musicians. — Frank Zappa
If you look at music, you see theme, variation, you see symmetry, asymmetry, you see structure, and these are related to skills in the real world. — Dave Van Ronk
Music is the arithmetic of sounds as optics is the geometry of light. — Claude Debussy
Composers shouldn't think too much - it interferes with their plagiarism. — Howard Dietz
A creative artist works on his next composition because he was not satisfied with his previous one. — Dmitri Shostakovich
A great piece of music is beautiful regardless of how it is performed. — Dmitri Shostakovich
Music is a hidden arithmetic exercise of the soul, which does not know that it is counting. — Gottfried Leibniz
There is nothing greater than the joy of composing something oneself and then listening to it. — Clara Schumann
If a composer could say what he had to say in words he would not bother trying to say it in music. — Gustav Mahler
Music is...the coordination between man and time. — Igor Stravinsky
Life is like a piano, the white keys represent happiness and the black shows sadness, but as you go through life's journey, remember that the black keys also makes music.
Put all your soul into it, play the way you feel! — Frederic Chopin
Music is a labyrinth with no beginning and no end,
full of new paths to discover,
where mystery remains eternal — Pierre Boulez
Behind every girl's favorite song there is an untold story.
A gentleman is someone who can play the accordion, but doesn't. — Tom Waits
To study music, we must learn the rules. To create music, we must break them. — Nadia Boulanger
Whether I was in my body or out of my body as I wrote it I know not. God knows. — George Frideric Handel
Music, being identical with heaven, isn't a thing of momentary thrills, or even hourly ones. It's a condition of eternity. — Gustav Holst
Music Arrangement Quotes
One can speak poetry just by arranging colors well, just as one can say comforting things in music. — Vincent Van Gogh
I never wrote music or arranged songs or lyrics when I was under the influence of anything but coffee. That's not gone away. — Chris Cornell
I got a scholarship to Seattle University and I was writing arrangements for singers and everybody. But the music course was too dry and I really wanted to get away from home. — Quincy Jones
The earth has music for those who listen.
The thing that I always notice that dates a record is the rhythm section. With a good arranger the music can be timeless. But, rhythm can change, because heaven knows, we didn't know rock was going to come in, did we? — Peggy Lee
Louie Bellson represents the epitome of musical talent. His ability to cover the whole musical spectrum from an elite percussionist to a very gifted composer and arranger never ceases to amaze me. I consider him one of the musical giants of our age. — Oscar Peterson
My musical director, Mark Cherry, is the most wonderful person who ever lived on God's good green Earth. He's my director, he does the arrangements. Really, he does everything - including certain janitorial chores! — Brett Somers
A real leader faces the music, even when he doesn't like the tune.
Arranging is the way I put my stamp on my music as much as my guitar playing. — Lee Ritenour
Yes, but I view Frank's music as fully composed. In other words, the arrangements can work for any idiom such as a rock band or an orchestra. Frank was a brilliant arranger and could make his music work in any context. He proved that tour after tour and album after album. — Dweezil Zappa
I was a schooled musician. When I made 'Blue Velvet', I told everyone what to do. I was an arranger. I learned music in school I told the band to play this. I told the guitar to do that. — Bobby Vinton
When I started making music, I made music in a very commercial space and I didn't have room to really explore things on my own terms. It took me awhile to create a little bubble where I could explore other things, and new things. When I did that, my tools were songwriting and arranging. — Robyn
Writing Music Quotes
We need to have music that contributes to the well-being of the spirit. Music that cradles people's lives and makes things a little easier. That's what I try to do, and what I want to do. You don't want to close the door on hope. — Merle Haggard
When I open my mouth and sing, the truth comes out. When I write, the truth comes out. I can't lie. That, I think, is one of the strongest elements of my music. When people talk about my writing as though I'm doing it from an accountant's perspective, it really pisses me off. — George Michael
Art is how we decorate space; Music is how we decorate time.
I feel like a ghost wandering in a world grown alien. I cannot cast out the old way of writing and I cannot acquire the new. I have made an intense effort to feel the musical manner of today, but it will not come to me. — Sergei Rachmaninoff
Music expresses that which cannot be put into words. — Victor Hugo
At the age when Bengali youth almost inevitably writes poetry, I was listening to European classical music. — Satyajit Ray
A painter paints pictures on canvas. But musicians paint their pictures on silence.
I'm writing songs that connect to millions of people. And that happens for a reason. I don't really worry too much about people who aren't into it because that's the beauty of music. It's subjective. If every single person in the world loved our music, then that'd be weird. — Matthew Healy
I think its so cool that you can pick up the guitar and create something that didn't exist 5 minutes ago. You can write something that no ones ever heard before. You have music at your fingertips. — Michelle Branch
Ability, when trained, becomes proficiency. Scribbling through training becomes hand writing. Talking through training becomes communication. Noise, under proper training becomes music. Don’t be satisfied with ability. Take the responsibility to make it a proficiency. — Mahatria Ra
I write the vocals last, because I wanted to invent the music first and push the music to the level that I had to compete against it. — Axl Rose
Musical Expression Quotes
It's a dream come true, and with this music, with this Rossini, it's unbelievable how to express the joy and express the joy of the situation and the joy to play this music, to sing this music, it's really fantastic. — Cecilia Bartoli
I want to express the feelings that everyone has felt at least once in music so i think people will feel/understand my song. — G-Dragon
My music is the spiritual expression of what I am — my faith, my knowledge, my being...When you begin to see the possibilities of music, you desire to do something really good for people, to help humanity free itself from its hangups...I want to speak to their souls. — John Coltrane
People are like Music, some speak the truth and other are just noise
My music is the spiritual expression of what I am: my faith, my knowledge, my being. — John Coltrane
Music does bring people together. It allows us to experience the same emotions. People everywhere are the same in heart and spirit. No matter what language we speak, what color we are, the form of our politics or the expression of our love and our faith, music proves: We are the same. — John Denver
Music expresses that which cannot remain silent and that which cannot be put into words. — Victor Hugo
Music is the emotional life of most people.
Music begins where words are powerless to express. Music is made for the inexpressible. I want music to seem to rise from the shadows and indeed sometimes to return to them. — Claude Debussy
Music is something I've always been interested in and incorporated into my videos. — Jake Paul
The art of Mime encompasses all the feelings of the soul. The Dance, on the other hand, is essentially an expression of joy, a desire to follow the rhythms of the music. — August Bournonville
Music, uniquely among the arts, is both completely abstract and profoundly emotional. It has no power to represent anything particular or external, but it has a unique power to express inner states or feelings. Music can pierce the heart directly; it needs no mediation. — Oliver Sacks
Compositional Quotes
People err who think my art comes easily to me. I assure you, dear friend, nobody has devoted so much time and thought to compositions as I. There is not a famous master whose music I have not industriously studied through many times. — Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart
Of all the arts, abstract painting is the most difficult. It demands that you know how to draw well, that you have a heightened sensitivity for composition and for colors, and that you be a true poet. This last is essential. — Wassily Kandinsky
Human blood has a chemical composition startlingly similar to seawater. An infant will reflexively breaststroke when placed underwater and can comfortably hold his breath for about forty seconds, longer than many adults. We lose this ability only when we learn how to walk. — James Nestor
One good thing about music. When it hits you, you feel no pain.
I am essentially a painter of the kind of still life composition that communicates a sense of tranquillity and privacy, moods which I have always valued above all else. — Giorgio Morandi
I never retouch a sketch: I take a canvas the same size, as I may change the composition somewhat. But I always strive to give the same feeling, while carrying it on further. — Henri Matisse
We are all patchwork, and so shapeless and diverse in composition that each bit, each moment, plays its own game. — Michel de Montaigne
Without music, life would be a mistake.
If measure and symmetry are absent from any composition in any degree, ruin awaits both the ingredients and the composition... Measure and symmetry are beauty and virtue the world over. — Socrates
It is most difficult to acquire the, how shall I say? the 'depth' of a subject in composition in silhouette. — Ugo Mochi
Attempts have been made from a study of the changes produced by mutation to obtain the relative order of the bases within various triplets, but my own view is that these are premature until there is more extensive and more reliable data on the composition of the triplets. — Francis Crick
Viewed freely, the English language is the accretion and growth of every dialect, race, and range of time, and is both the free and compacted composition of all. — Walt Whitman
I have never doubted the importance of melody. I like melody very much, and I consider it the most important element in music, and I labour many years on the improvement of its quality in my compositions. — Sergei Prokofiev
The art of mastering life is the prerequisite for all further forms of expression, whether they are paintings, sculptures, tragedies, or musical compositions. — Paul Klee
Jazz music is a style, not compositions; any kind of music may be played in Jazz if one has the knowledge. — Jelly Roll Morton
The joy of music should never be interrupted by a commercial. — Leonard Bernstein
Part of Michael's uniqueness, I think, comes from the fact that he worked with music. He had a tape which he gave me with many different compositions, really eclectic. These pieces of music were sources of inspiration. — Madeleine Stowe
Musical composition should bring happiness and joy to people and make them forget their troubles. — Horace Silver
Movies are pieces of film stuck together in a certain rhythm, an absolute beat, like a musical composition. The rhythm you create affects the audience. — John Carpenter
I want less and less control with music. Just playing music without any idea of composition or writing. — Yann Tiersen
The creation and destruction of harmonic and 'statistical' tensions is essential to the maintenance of compositional drama. Any composition (or improvisation) which remains consonant and 'regular' throughout is, for me, equivalent to watching a movie with only 'good guys' in it, or eating cottage cheese. — Frank Zappa
Is it not the business of the conductor to convey to the public in its dramatic form the central idea of a composition; and how can he convey that idea successfully if he does not enter heart and soul into the life of the music and the tale it unfolds? — John Philip Sousa
In composition you have all the time you want to decide what to say in 15 seconds, in improvisation you have 15 seconds. — Steve Lacy
For it is a plain fact that, most certainly in the West, the writings, works of art, musical compositions which are of central reference, comport that which is "grave and constant" (Joyce's epithets) in the mystery of our condition. — George Steiner
I cannot copy nature in a servile way; I am forced to interpret nature and submit it to the spirit of the picture. From the relationship I have found in all the tones there must result a living harmony of colors, a harmony analogous to that of a musical composition. — Henri Matisse
It's [music composition] the most effortless thing in the world because you don't do anything. I hate to say it like that, but it's the truth. — Michael Jackson
From a very early period of my life I have derived the highest enjoyment from listening to music, especially to melody, which is to me the most pleasing form of composition. — James Nasmyth
Typography is to literature as musical performance is to composition: an essential act of interpretation, full of endless opportunities for insight or obtuseness. — Robert Bringhurst
I treat the photograph as a work of great complexity in which you can find drama. Add to that a careful composition of landscapes, live photography, the right music and interviews with people, and it becomes a style. — Ken Burns
I began seriously concentrating on music study after I entered senior high school. I went to a class in the arts section at the YMCA and learned music theory and composition. Today, there are many classes like this available, but this was not so much the case in those days. — Isao Tomita
When we look at a painting, listen to a piece of music, read a novel, or watch a movie we are taking in the artist's composition. The composition is the totality of the work. — Mike Svob
What I try to impart to a musician is to really try to practice the instrument in a really sincere way. Learn as much about music as you possibly can. Learn composition. Study to try to create compositions of your own and put your own personal touch on your music. — Roscoe Mitchell
And the invention of transformations of certain figures has become the most important in musical composition. — Karlheinz Stockhausen
There is much modern music that is better adapted to a wind combination than to a string, although for obvious reasons originally scored for an orchestra. If in such cases the interpretation is equal to the composition the balance of a wind combination is more satisfying. — John Philip Sousa
To the average mind popular music would mean compositions vulgarly conceived and commonplace in their treatment. That is absolutely false. — John Philip Sousa
Cinema is a composite art into which you can include all conceivable art or entertainment forms. In film, I can work with novelistic elements, comedy, drama, music, and other forms of entertainment. Film is a versatile expression, combining all elements into one art form. — Takeshi Kitano
Most of my records are very dense, composition-heavy, and there's bits of different kinds of music like an acoustic ballad, instrumental trio pieces, and vocal tracks. — Steve Vai
To me music is the sound of nature in process, either the full cacophony, one thread of it, or a deliberate composition. It's both expressive and causal and can organize reality atmosphere like a law of physics. — Warren Jeffs
Writers and musicians know well the importance of extensive reading for successful writing or extensive listening for musical composition. Likewise, visual artists... understand that successful artistic creativity depends upon extensive visual exposure. — Paul Laseau
The more composed scenes are like elevator music compared to some of the more dynamic styles of music. One is not better than the other. They both deserve their spots in the world. — Jean Wilson
There is a kinship between music and painting - with the same words used to describe both, as when a musical composition is said to have color and a painting to have rhythm. — Alton Tobey
The sound of the rain needs no translation. In music one doesn't make the end of the composition the point of the composition... Same way in dancing, you don't aim at one particular spot in the room... The whole point of dancing is the dance. — Alan Watts
Monk taught me more about music composition than anyone else on 52nd Street. — Miles Davis
All great musical composers have been connected, consciously or unconsciously, with this source of music-a fact that enabled them to become masters of their art. Their compositions contain specific messages brought through from high realms for the definite purpose of bettering world conditions and bestowing upon mankind greater illumination. — Corinne Heline
There are some experiences in life which should not be demanded twice from any man, and one of them is listening to the Brahms Requiem. — George Bernard Shaw
That what is true of business and politics is gloriously true of the professions, the arts and crafts, the sciences, the sports. That the best picture has not yet been painted; the greatest poem is still unsung; the mightiest novel remains to be written; the divinest music has not been conceived even by Bach. In science, probably ninety-nine percent of the knowable has to be discovered. We know only a few streaks about astronomy. We are only beginning to imagine the force and composition of the atom. Physics has not yet found any indivisible matter, or psychology a sensible soul. — Lincoln Steffens
How can one express the indefinable sensations that one experiences while writing an instrumental composition that has no definite subject? It is a purely lyrical process. It is a musical confession of the soul, which unburdens itself through sounds just as a lyric poet expresses himself through poetry...As the poet Heine said, 'Where words leave off, music begins.' — Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky
Composition in photography is almost as varied as composition in music or words -- melodic or atonal, safe or daring -- and can enhance subject, theme, and style. Every photograph you take involves you in some compositional decision, even if this is simply where to set up the camera or when to press the button. — Michael Langford
The resolving of the ethical, is freedom; the negative resolution also has this, but the freedom, blank and bare, is as if tongue-tied, hard to express, and generally has something hard in its nature. Falling in love, however, promptly sets it to music, even if this composition contains a very difficult passage. — Soren Kierkegaard
I could not accept the academic idea that the purpose of music was communication, because I noticed that when I conscientiously wrote something sad, people and critics were often apt to laugh. I determined to give up composition unless I could find a better reason for doing it than communication. I found this answer from Gira Sarabhai, an Indian singer and tabla player: The purpose of music is to sober and quiet the mind, thus making it susceptible to divine influences. I also found in the writings of Ananda K. Coomaraswammy that the responsibility of the artist is to imitate nature in her manner of operation. I became less disturbed and went back to work. — John Milton Cage
In serial music, the series itself is seldom audible... What I'm interested in is a compositional process and a sounding music that are one in the same thing. — Steve Reich
I never presumed that a technique of composition or an idea was so special that just using it would guarantee the quality of the music. — Robert Morris
My training in music and composition then led me to a kind of musical language process in which, for example, the sound of the words I play with has to expose their true meaning against their will so to speak. — Elfriede Jelinek
If you want to find the source of much of the music of modern day Russia, you will find it in the incredible compositions of that crazed lunatic Berlioz. — Ray Bradbury
In Conclusion
Which quotation resonated with you best? Did you enjoy our collection of musical composition quotes? Or may be you have a slogan about musical composition to suggest. Let us know using our contact form.
Citation
Feel free to cite and use any of the quotes in this collection of musical composition quotations. For popular citation styles(APA, Chicago, MLA), please use this citation page.
