100 Reading Music Quotes

Following is our list of reading music quotations and slogans full of insightful wisdom and perspective about studying music.

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Famous Reading Music Quotes

I can't read sheet music, I have to just listen to it, and then just go for it. — Scott Weiland

Look at the piano. You'll notice that there are white notes and black notes. Figure out the difference between them and you'll be able to make whatever kind of music you want. — George Gershwin

Learning to read music in Braille and play by ear helped me develop a damn good memory. — Ray Charles

I never took sheet music seriously. I could do better myself just by listening to other people and using my own intuition. — Brian May

A lot of people think that if they learn to read music they are gonna lose their feel or their groove or something. It's the stupidest thing I have ever heard. — Frank Gambale

Music is the space between the notes. - Claude Debussy

Music is the space between the notes. — Claude Debussy

Music is the arithmetic of sounds as optics is the geometry of light. — Claude Debussy

Music is the thousandth of a millisecond between one note and another; how you get from one to the other-that's where the music is. — Isaac Stern

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

We all do 'do, re, mi,' but you have got to find the other notes yourself. — Louis Armstrong

When you know the lyrics to a tune, you have some kind of insight as to it's composition. — Dexter Gordon

You just have to press the right keys and the right pedals at the right time and the music plays itself. — Johann Sebastian Bach

In terms of brain development, musical performance is every bit as important educationally as reading or writing. — Oliver Sacks

It's easy to play any musical instrument: all you have to do is touch the right key at the right time and the instrument will play itself. — Johann Sebastian Bach

If you want to make beautiful music, you must play the black and the white notes together. — Richard M. Nixon

Short Reading Music Quotes

  • Music is a hidden arithmetic exercise of the soul, which does not know that it is counting. — Gottfried Leibniz
  • Text first, rhythm second, melody third. — Claudio Monteverdi
  • What is best in music is not to be found in the notes. — Gustav Mahler
  • The architect must not only understand drawing, but music. — Marcus Vitruvius Pollio
  • The most efficient way to memorise a piece is to use the one which proceeds in an error free manner — Sayings
  • The music is not in the notes, but in the silence between. — Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart
  • I haven't understood a bar of music in my life, but I have felt it. — Igor Stravinsky
  • The material of music is sound and silence. Integrating these is composing. — John Cage
  • Music is the shorthand of emotion. — Leo Tolstoy
  • Listening is the key to everything good in music. — Pat Metheny

Top 10 Reading Music Quotes

Don’t you love the Oxford Dictionary? When I first read it, I thought it was a really really long poem about everything. — David Bowie

You don't make a photograph just with a camera. You bring to the act of photography all the pictures you have seen, the books you have read, the music you have heard, the people you have loved. — Ansel Adams

My personal hobbies are reading, listening to music, and silence. — Dame Edith Sitwell

My personal hobbies are reading, listening to music, and silence. — Edith Sitwell

I was improvising before I was reading music. I was just trying to play things on the clarinet by ear. I think my ear is one of my greatest assets. — Pete Fountain

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. — Igor Stravinsky

I’ll read my books and I’ll drink coffee and I’ll listen to music, and I’ll bolt the door. — J. D. Salinger

If I had my life to live over again, I would have made a rule to read some poetry and listen to some music at least once every week. — Charles Darwin

I remember when I was very young, I read an article by Fats Domino which has really influenced me. He said, 'You should never sing the lyrics out very clearly. — Mick Jagger

I adore watching movies; movie marathons are my favorite pastime. I can watch up to five movies back to back. I also love music and like reading whenever I get the time. — Priyanka Chopra

Reading Music Image Quotes

Reading music quote There comes a point in your life when you need to stop reading other people's book and write your ow
There comes a point in your life when you need to stop reading other people's book and write your own.

What Is Music Quotes

It's pretty clear now that what looked like it might have been some kind of counterculture is, in reality, just the plain old chaos of undifferentiated weirdness. — Jerry Garcia

I'm not a lyric writer to make statements. What I enjoy doing is making paintings with lyrics, creating colorful images. I think that's more what entertainment and music should be. — Chris Cornell

The vibrations on the air are the breath of God speaking to man's soul. Music is the language of God. We musicians are as close to God as man can be. We hear his voice, we read his lips, we give birth to the children of God, who sing his praise. That's what musicians are. — Ludwig van Beethoven

Reading music quote Life is like a piano, the white keys represent happiness and the black shows sadness, but as you go
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.

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

My music is the spiritual expression of what I am: my faith, my knowledge, my being. — John Coltrane

The only music minister to whom the Lord will say, 'Well done, thy good and faithful servant,' is the one whose life proves what their lyrics are saying, and to whom music is the least important part of their life. Glorifying the only worthy One has to be a minister's most important goal! — Keith Green

Reading music quote Behind every girl's favorite song there is an untold story.
Behind every girl's favorite song there is an untold story.

Music is a beautiful thing to listen to. It is not a thing to preach to others about, it’s not a cause. It is what it is-and that’s a beautiful artform. — Synyster Gates

I want longevity; I love music, being a musician is the greatest gift in the world to me, and if I were to get signed to a label, my family and team around me are always gonna be there to make sure they want the very best for me. My fans are what it's all about. — Christina Grimmie

The winds that sometimes take something we love, are the same that bring us something we learn to love. Therefore we should not cry about something that was taken from us, but, yes, love what we have been given. Because what is really ours is never gone forever. — Bob Marley

Life isn’t a music player where you choose whats being played, it is a radio where you have to enjoy whats being played. — Zayn Malik

Studying Music 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

To study music, we must learn the rules. To create music, we must break them. - Nadia Boulanger

To study music, we must learn the rules. To create music, we must break them. — Nadia Boulanger

I have to study politics and war so that my sons can study mathematics, commerce and agriculture, so their sons can study poetry, painting and music. — John Quincy Adams

Reading music quote Reading is dreaming with open eyes.
Reading is dreaming with open eyes.

When you are studying jazz, the best thing to do is listen to records or listen to live music. It isn't as though you go to a teacher. You just listen as much as you can and absorb everything. — Carla Bley

I was fifteen years old, and I hardly knew how to play a simple Bach prelude on the piano when I began to compose music, and at the most advanced level. I had never studied such things as harmony. — Gyorgy Legeti

I was fifteen years old, and I hardly knew how to play a simple Bach prelude on the piano when I began to compose music, and at the most advanced level. I had never studied such things as harmony. — Gyorgy Ligeti

I can't live one day without hearing music, playing it , studying it , or thinking about it . — Leonard Bernstein

When I'm 40, too old to be a rock star, I plan to go back to college to study classical music. — Chris Martin

I hope to refine music, study it, try to find some area that I can unlock. I don't quite know how to explain it but it's there. These can't be the only notes in the world, there's got to be other notes some place, in some dimension, between the cracks on the piano keys. — Marvin Gaye

The more one studies the harmony of music, and then studies human nature, how people agree and how they disagree, how there is attraction and repulsion, the more one will see that it is all music. — Hazrat Inayat Khan

People Writing About Reading Music

Name Quotes Likes
Read quotes by Claude Debussy

Claude Debussy

56 2296
Read quotes by Johann Sebastian Bach

Johann Sebastian Bach

30 1755
Read quotes by Igor Stravinsky

Igor Stravinsky
quotes on education, life and leadership

97 1172
Read quotes by Scott Weiland

Scott Weiland
quotes on love, life and death

46 360
Read quotes by George Gershwin

George Gershwin
quotes on life, love and music

37 448
Read quotes by Ray Charles

Ray Charles
quotes on life, race

82 1178

More Reading Music Quotes

It's like a novelist writing far out things. If it makes a point and makes sense, then people like to read that. But if it's off in left field and goes over the edge, you lose it. The same with musical talent, I think. — Johnny Cash

My free time at home is usually spent emailing, listening to music, reading and talking on the phone. I wish I was on the phone less, but I have been fortunate to stay in touch with so many incredible friends. — Steve Nash

Beethoven’s music always struck me. Always. He had this fire you know. I remember reading this story of him going deaf and pushing himself into self-isolation and that’s where he became himself. And to me that was, wow. Don’t let anything poison your individuality. Be away, break away and look in not outward. — Rodney Mullen

I was in every band class I could get in, like after school jazz band and marching band, and that's where I really learned to read music from elementary all the way through junior high and high school. — Chad Smith

A man should hear a little music, read a little poetry, and see a fine picture every day of his life, in order that worldly cares may not obliterate the sense of the beautiful which God has implanted in the human soul. — Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

There is nothing is more musical than a sunset. He who feels what he sees will find no more beautiful example of development in all that book which, alas, musicians read but too little - the book of Nature. — Claude Debussy

There are many ways to calm a negative energy without suppressing or fighting it. You recognize it, you smile to it, and you invite something nicer to come up and replace it; you read some inspiring words, you listen to a piece of beautiful music, you go somewhere in nature, or you do some walking meditation. — Nhat Hanh

In noise can be read the codes of life, the relations among men. Clamour, Melody, Dissonance, Harmony; when it is fashioned by man with specific tools, when it invades man’s time, when it becomes sound, noise is the source of the purpose and power, of the dream – Music. — Jacques Attali

Sometimes I sensed that the books I read in rapid succession had set up some sort of murmur among themselves, transforming my head into an orchestra pit where different musical instruments sounded out, and I would realize that I could endure this life because of these musicales going on in my head. — Orhan Pamuk

Today begins a new saga in my life which I expect to strengthen me and allow me time for reflection... I plan to write music while in prison, read and pray regularly and will come out a stronger, more confident woman. — Lil' Kim

I never had any lessons. When I first started playing I used to read music. I was very interested in music. But when I started playing in groups I did a silly thing and dropped it. It's great if you can write things down. — John Bonham

We pass the word around; we ponder how the case is put by different people, we read the poetry; we meditate over the literature; we play the music; we change our minds; we reach an understanding. Society evolves this way, not by shouting each other down, but by the unique capacity of unique, individual human beings to comprehend each other. — Lewis Thomas

It's what the Pixies always said about music - they were writing songs and just trying not to be boring. That was their main motivation and it worked for them. I remember reading that and thinking that was the way to do it. — Jonny Greenwood

Guitarists shouldn't get too riled up about all of the great players that were left off of 'Rolling Stone Magazines' list of the Greatest Guitar Players of all Time' ... Rolling Stone is published for people who read the magazine because they don't know what to wear. — Joe Satriani

The bookstore was a parking lot for used graveyards. Thousands of graveyards were parked in rows like cars. Most of the books were out of print, and no one wanted to read them any more and the people who had read the books had died or forgotten about them, but through the organic process of music the books had become virgins again. — Richard Brautigan

Why are we rock stars? Because we're morons. We sleep all day, we play music at night and very rarely do we sit around reading the Washington Journal. — Alice Cooper

I have got to do something that makes me focus on one thing, and so I will sit and listen to music, or I will read, or I will go and make ammunition in my workshop. I have just got to keep myself busy. — David Feherty

A musicologist is a man who can read music but cannot hear it. — Sir Thomas Beecham

To know how to suggest is the great art of teaching. To attain it we must be able to guess what will interest; we must learn to read the childish soul as we might a piece of music. Then, by simply changing the key, we keep up the attraction and vary the song. — Henri Frederic Amiel

The object we call a book is not the real book, but its potential, like a musical score or seed. It exists fully only in the act of being read; and its real home is inside the head of the reader, where the symphony resounds, the seed germinates. A book is a heart that only beats in the chest of another. — Rebecca Solnit

Fashion intersects a lot with art and film and music, and that was appealing to me. I read a bunch of fashion blogs and wanted to be part of the community. — Tavi Gevinson

Anyone who says the Backstreet Boys can't sing is crazy. They're probably just reading some highbrow critic who hates anyone the general public embraces. I'm sorry, but those boys sing their butts off. They work hard on their choreography, and on their harmonies. Their tracks are tight and solid. Their songs are musical and memorable. — Tony Orlando

Assemble a mob of men and women previously conditioned by a daily reading of the newspapers; treat them to amplified band music, bright lights...and in next to no time you can reduce them to a state of almost mindless subhumanity. Never before have so few been in a position to make fools, maniacs, or criminals of so many. — Aldous Huxley

One of the things that's clear to me from interviews that I've read is that the more popular successful jazz musicians had audiences above and beyond the music community. — Branford Marsalis

By reading the scriptures I am so renewed that all nature seems renewed around me and with me. The sky seems to be a pure, a cooler blue, the trees a deeper green. The whole world is charged with the glory of God and I feel fire and music under my feet. — Thomas Merton

Lots of things inspire me. My friends and my family, obviously. I really like to travel, so very inspired by traveling and meeting new people along the way. Also, music and the arts, like film and television. I like to read a lot too; that stuff inspires me. — Jessica McNamee

I've been changed watching films or reading books or hearing music, and that helps you to live your life. — Juliette Binoche

I`m down to Earth, a lover of music, making music and making love. I love to make people happy and I think I`m basically a good person … despite what you might read about me. — Duff McKagan

The whole world is charged with the glory of God and I feel fire and music under my feet. — Thomas Merton

Reading music is like listening to flowers. I don't understand the concept. — Paul Westerberg

In Conclusion

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