Pianists

"Pop music is probably the only art form that is totally dependent for its success on the general public. The more people buy a record, the more successful it is - not only commercially but artistically."

"Scriabin always said that everything within his later compositions was strictly according to 'law.' He said that he could prove this fact. However, everything seemed to conspire against his giving a demonstration. One day he invited Taneyev and I to his apartment so he could explain his theories of composition. We arrived and he dilly-dallied for a long time. Finally, he said he had a headache and would explain it all another day. That 'another day' never came."

"Skryabin comes so close to the twelve-note system that it seems probable he would have taken it as the next logical step."

"Scriabin isn't the sort of composer whom you'd regard as your daily bread, but is a heavy liqueur on which you can get drunk periodically, a poetical drug, a crystal that's easily broken."

"I eat only white foods: eggs, sugar, grated bones, the fat of dead animals; veal, salt, coconut, chicken cooked in white water; fruit mold, rice, turnips; camphorated sausage, dough, cheese (white), cotton salad, and certain fish (skinless).""

"Étude pour un buste de M. Erik SATIE peint par lui-même, avec une pensée: je suis venu au monde très jeune dans un temps très vieux."

"On the first movement of Claude Debussy's La Mer, From Dawn to Noon: " Ah, my dear friend, there's one particular moment between half past ten and a quarter to eleven that I found stunning!" (with slight variations in phrasing and translation)"

"nothing but an icy loneliness that fills the head with emptiness and the heart with sadness."

"I took to my room and let small things evolve slowly."

"Postulez en vous-même."

"Munissez-vous de clairvoyance."

"Seul, pendant un instant."

"Très perdu."

"Ouvrez la tête."

"Superstitieusement."

"D'une manière très particulière."

"Léger comme un œuf."

"Comme un rossignol qui aurait mal aux dents."

"Citation de la célèbre mazurka de SCHUBERT"

"Modéré, je vous prie."

"Un peu chaud."

"Très turc."

"The trees creak with their arthritic arms / brittle in their powederd bark / this year took ten years to / tell me that I'm alone again"

"If it's sad / you know it's true / God is glad on bluer moons / When your room is all you do / it comes to you"

"We put a monkey up in space / and I know exactly how he felt / looking at a lattice work of stars / missing his brothers back home too much for a postcard"

"Turtle on its back in the desert sea / and you look like a cool drink / just slightly out of reach / Draw myself into the shell / waiting on a sign from God / or a nod from hell"

"Be a believer / Believe everything / You'll be right half the time"

"Everyone tells me they're crazy / Crazy people aren't so fucking boring / Wake me when you're through being cool 'cause I'm snoring"

"You don't know what I'm all about / Like killing cops and reading Kerouac"

"Put my ear to the door / I just heard gunshots and hot rods and sirensPeople kill me these days / There's keys in their eyes but they lock from the inside"

"The records I end up liking I don't like right off the bat. I want to call our next record Tenth Listen. That's the test."

"Maybe I should try singing like a man."

"JB: We had 200 Russians lined up pointing their weapons at us aggressively, which was... and you know we'd been told to reach the airfield and take a hold of it. And if we had a foothold there then it would make life much easier for the NATO forces in Pristina. So there was a political reason to take hold of this. And the practical consequences of that political reason would be then aggression against the Russians. Interviewer: Might have been World War III. JB: Absolutely. And that's why we were querying our instruction from an American general. Fortunately, up on the radio came Gen Mike Jackson, whose exact words at the time were, 'I'm not going to have my soldiers be responsible for starting World War III, and told us why don't we sugar off down the road, you know, encircle the airfield instead."

"Beautiful dawn (beautiful dawn) You're just blowing my mind again Thought I was born to endless night, until you shine.High. Running wild among all the stars above Sometimes it's hard to believe you remember me."

"My life is brilliant, My love is pure. I saw an angel, Of that I'm sure. She smiled at me on the subway; She was with another man. But I won't lose no sleep on that 'Cause I've got a plan."

"You're beautiful. You're beautiful. You're beautiful, it's true. I saw your face in a crowded place, And I don't know what to do. 'Cause I'll never be with you."

"Look who's alone now, It's not me, it's not me. Those three wise men, They've got a semi by the sea. Got to ask yourself the question, Where are you now? Got to ask yourself the question, Where are you now?"

"I am a dreamer and when I wake, You can't break my spirit - it's my dreams you take. And as you move on, remember me. Remember us and all we used to be. I've seen you cry, I've seen you smile. I've watched you sleeping for a while. I'd be the father of your child; I'd spend a lifetime with you. I know your fears and you know mine, We've had our doubts but now we're fine. And I love you, I swear that's true. I cannot live without you."

"There are children standing here, Arms outstretched into the sky, Tears drying on their face. He has been here. Brothers lie in shallow graves, Fathers lost without a trace. A nation blind to their disgrace, Since he's been here.And I see no bravery, No bravery in your eyes anymore. Only sadness."

"I would call you up every Saturday night And we'd both stay out 'til the morning light. And we sang "Here we go again." And though time goes by, I will always be in a club with you in 1973, Singing "Here we go again.""

"Saw the world turning in my sheets And once again, I cannot sleep. Walk out the door and up the street, Look at the stars beneath my feet. Remember rights that I did wrong. So here I go."

"Trouble is her only friend and he's back again. Makes her body older than it really is. She says it's high time she went away. No one's got much to say in this town. Trouble is the only way is down, Down, down.As strong as you were, tender you go. I'm watching you breathing for the last time. A song for your heart, but when it is quiet, I know what it means and I'll carry you home. I'll carry you home."

"Many prophets preach on bended knee, Many clerics wasted wine. Do the bloody sheets On those cobbled streets mean I have wasted time?"

"And if this is what we’ve got, then what we’ve got is gold We’re shining bright and I want you, I want you to know The morning’s on its way Our friends all say goodbye There’s nowhere else to go I hope that you’ll stay the night You'll stay the night."

"Tell me the wars you're fighting Behind the smile you're hiding All of the things I know you want to say We tried our best to find us But there are no lights to guide us I can't sleep beside a stranger now And piece by piece we fall apart With every beat slows down my heart."

"So many voices, Too many noises. Invisible lies keeping us apart. So many choices, but they're all disappointment And they only steal me away from you. Climb into our own private bubble, Let's get into all kinds of trouble."

"If time is all I have, I'll waste it all on you. Each day I'll turn it back. It's what the broken-hearted do. I'm tired of talking to an empty space Of silences keeping me awake."

"Your mouth is a revolver, firing bullets in the sky (Mh-mh-mh-mh) Your love is like a soldier, loyal 'till you die (Mh-mh-mh-mh) And I’ve been looking at the stars for a long, long time I’ve been putting out fires all my life Everybody wants a flame, they don’t want to get burnt And today is our turnDays like these lead to Nights like this lead to Love like ours You light the spark in my bonfire heart People like us, we don’t Need that much, just some One that starts, starts the spark in our bonfire hearts."

"It's ok, cause I know You shine even on a rainy day And I can find your halo Guides me to wherever you fall If you need a hand to hold I'll come running, because You and I won't part till we die You should know We see eye to eye, heart to heart."

"I'm sending postcards from my heart Your love for a postmark and then You know that you make me feel like We've been caught like kids in the schoolyard again And I can't keep it to myself."

"When I met you I was treading water And baby I know you know I got an eye that wanders But right now in this car that we're driving to your sister's All I'm lookin' for is something that's forever."

"It's a little after midnight There's a couple in the corner And I wonder what he said because she's crying And I guess they won't remember When they wake up in the morning With the headache from the whiskey and the wine I know that I have said things I regret when I am sober 'Cause we always hurt the ones we love the most."

"Don't give me those eyes 'cause you know me and I can't say no to you We can't have each other even if we wanted to In another life, darling, I'll do anything to be with you We can't have each other even if we wanted to Don't give me those eyes, don't give me those eyes."

"Without your arms around me, without you on my skin Without you on my body, I’m sorry, I’m sorry I don’t mean to be desperate or pretend that I’m not torn But I don’t want to let go of the things that keep me warm Without you, I’m just cold."

"I'm not your son, you're not my father We're just two grown men saying goodbye No need to forgive, no need to forget I know your mistakes and you know mine And while you're sleeping, I'll try to make you proud So, daddy, won't you just close your eyes? Don't be afraid, it's my turn To chase the monsters away."

"I don't get it... did we look like transvestites or something?"

"I'd hate the sound of thirty thousand people booing."

"I am now satisfied that the future music of this country must be founded upon what are called negro melodies. This must be the real foundation of any serious and original school of composition to be developed in the United States."

"In the negro melodies of America I discover all that is needed for a great and noble school of music. They are pathetic, tender, passionate, melancholy, solemn, religious, bold, merry, gay or what you will. It is music that suits itself to any mood or any purpose. There is nothing in the whole age of composition that cannot be supplied with themes from this source."

"It cannot be emphasized too strongly that art, as such, does not "pay," to use an American expression – at least, not in the beginning – and that the art that has to pay its own way is apt to become vitiated and cheap."

"The music of the people is like a rare and lovely flower growing amidst encroaching weeds. Thousands pass it, while others trample it under foot, and thus the chances are that it will perish before it is seen by the one discriminating spirit who will prize it above all else. The fact that no one has as yet arisen to make the most of it does not prove that nothing is there."

"The Americans expect great things of me... If the small Czech nation can have such musicians, they say, why could not they, too, when their country and people is so immense."

"I'm in love with a fairytale, even though it hurts. 'Cause I don`t care if I lose my mind; Im already cursed."

"Every day we started fighting. Every night we fell in love. No one else could make me sadder. But no one else could lift me high above."

"People call me stupid for treating you like a queen, but I dont even worry `cause you`re my unforeseen. And I hope that you`ll be with me, if only in my dreams. But here you are next to me and you`re glad, or so it seems."

"Don`t promise me forever, just love me day by day."

"Your boyfriends might be angry, my girlfriends might be blue. But no one can deny it, from now on I love you."

"Sweet and lovely, sweeter than the roses in May, And she loves me, there is nothing more I can say."

"I may seem proud; I may act gay, It's just a pose; I'm not that way, .'Cause deep down in my heart I say, I surrender, dear."

"So rare, You're like the sparkle of old champagne; Orchids in cellophane Couldn't compare to you."

"I fell in love with you first time I looked into Them there eyes. You've got a certain li'l cute way of flirtin' with Them there eyes."

"Music is the art of sounds in the movement of time."

"Compared with this art, Schoenberg’s Pierrot lunaire is lukewarm lemonade."

"Moreover, most of the child composers known from the second half of the century composed relatively little: only Strauss (1864–1949) and Busoni (1866–1924) produced works in numbers that rival those of Mozart and Mendelssohn, with Bartók (1881–1945), Enescu (1881–1955), Prokofiev (1891–1953), Langgaard (1893–1952), and Korngold (1897–1957) some way behind."

"Until the autumn of 1934 I had no harpsichord of my own. But a group of people in Boston made it possible for me to buy the Dolmetsch-Chickering instrument that had belonged to Busoni (illus.1). I used this instrument for the first time in Boston at the Harvard Musical Association. This concert began inauspiciously enough with my leaving behind the key to the instrument in Cambridge, and having to send someone to fetch it."

"Busch suggested that Serkin should go to Berlin to study with Ferruccio Busoni (who, as it happens, was a close friend of Isidor Philipp’s). “The next day,” concludes Leonie Gombrich, “father Serkin came, and everything was settled.”"

"Berlin’s most eminent musical personality in the early interwar years was the great pianist and composer Ferruccio Busoni, who had returned there from Zurich in 1920, summoned, like Schreker, to help build the cultural life of the new Republic."

"Serkin and Busch prepared Busoni’s second violin sonata for performance. Busoni gave them an audience and was pleased with their performance. (He told Serkin he was too old for lessons, but that he should attend as many concerts as possible and play with more pedal.) Shortly afterward, Serkin and Busch heard Busoni and Egon Petri play the same piece (on November 16, 1921 in the Beethoven-Saal, in an arrangement for two pianos) at twice their tempo."

"Serkin began to record in the late 1920s. His first effort was on piano rolls with the Freiburg firm of Welte. Its Welte-Mignon recording and playing mechanisms had yielded over five thousand rolls since 1904, rendering ghostly, automated performances by many of the period’s best-known composers and pianists, including Saint-Saens, Grieg, Fauré, Mahler, Paderewski, Debussy, D’Albert, Strauss, Busoni, Scriabin, Ravel, Respighi, and Bartók."

"Like Liszt, for whom he had a profound admiration, Ferruccio Busoni devoted a significant part of his output to arrangement in all its forms: straightforward reductions, transcriptions, fantasies on operatic themes, concert versions, and Nachdichtungen. Indeed, for many years, Busoni's name his been unfortunately associated more with his transcriptions, especially those of Johann Sebastian Bach's organ works, than with his original compositions."

"Despite the important ideas and stimuli for new works that his presence in the United States brought him, Busoni's interest in America appeared to be in the financial reward that he could reap from concert tours. Frequent performances and constant travel undoubtedly took precious time from his composing schedule, which might help to explain the negative comments that he made about the United States, its people, and the state of music-making in this country. Extended periods of absence from the cultural ambience of Europe, where he had been raised, was painful for him, as were the countless receptions that he attended with well-meaning amateurs, as well as the constant pressure for publicity by his agent and, above all, the cultural differences between Europe and America."

"What most piano teachers mean by a beautiful tone is centered on bringing out the melody, and always setting the melody in high relief is characteristic of Viennese piano style. Ferrucio Busoni, ideologically more Viennese than Italian, once said that “any melody worth playing should be played mezzo forte”; in the end, this leads to the typical conservatory performance of a Bach fugue with the opening motif played louder than all the other voices each time it appears. Most theories about beautiful piano tone try to impose the same kind of sound on every style from Bach to Debussy."

"Another noteworthy fact is that Ferruccio Busoni, who also developed the Liszt piano tradition, began his teaching career at the Moscow Conservatoire. He worked there only one year (1889-90) but among his students was Yelena Gnesina."

"The viola is the saddest of all instruments."

"I learn from thinking about the future, what hasn't been done yet. That's kind of my constant obsession."

"The avant-garde makes more sense to me."

"I'm content with making records, but I don't want to be doing the same thing all the time."

"The value of having a computer, to me, is that it'll remember everything you do. It's a databank."

"If you're all loaded up on love, you haven't got anywhere else to go."

"The only reason we wore sunglasses onstage was because we couldn't stand the sight of the audience."

"When somebody grabs a movement, you're kind of locked into it. It's all par for the course."

"Being a living legend is such a precarious livelihood. It’s like being a bar of soap in a shower which doesn’t have any water in it."

"I use cracks on the sidewalk to walk down the street. I'd always walk on the lines. I never take anything but a calculated risk, and do it because it gives me a sense of identity. Fear is a man's best friend."

"I am a ham. I've no business being rock 'n' roll. I've said it over and over again that I'm a classical composer, dishevelling my personality by dabbling in rock 'n' roll."

"I'm bent on proving that you can make living as musician and not die young and crazy like Mozart."

"I only hope that one day John will be recognized as … the Beethoven or something of his day. He knows so much about music, he's such a great musician. He's completely mad - but that's because he's Welsh."

"John Cale is fantastic, and he made the sound of the Velvet Underground."

"Never knew whether John Cale wanted to be Elvis Presley, Frankenstein's creature or the young Chopin."

"John Cale is a f*cking elitist. He did not like the people he was playing for. He's Welsh, and they're all nasty bastards."

"We are living in a time of dissent, upheaval, revolutions and struggle, frequently aimed at mutual destruction."

"With each technological ‘revolution’, more energies began to be accessed, stored, and used than had been in the preceding epoch…On the whole, technological change is irreversible: whatever the nature of a technological revolution, it is always from the hoe to the plough, and not the other way around…Improvement generally means greater efficiency in the use of energy, materials, or information. It means greater speed, less investment of time and money, and operation on a larger scale."

"In sum, the processes of evolution create initially comparatively simple dynamical systems on particular levels of organisation. The processes then lead to the progressive complexification of the existing systems and, ultimately, to the creation of simpler systems on the next higher organisational level, where complexification begins anew. Thus evolution moves from the simpler to the more complex, and from the lower to the higher level of organisation"

"[ Technology is] the instrumentality for accessing and using free energies in human societies for human and social purposes."

"The new information technologies can be seen to drive societies toward increasingly dynamic high-energy regions further and further from thermodynamical equilibrium, characterized by decreasing specific entropy and increasingly dense free-energy flows, accessed and processed by more and more complex social, economic, and political structures."

"The description of the evolutionary trajectory of as irreversible, periodically chaotic, and strongly nonlinear fits certain features of the historical development of human societies. But the description of evolutionary processes, whether in nature or in history, has additional elements. These elements include such factors as the convergence of existing systems on progressively higher organizational levels, the increasingly efficient exploitation by systems of the sources of free energy in their environment, and the complexification of systems structure in states progressively further removed from thermodynamic equilibrium. General evolution theory, based on the integration of the relevant tenets of general system theory, cybernetics, information and communication theory, chaos theory, dynamical systems theory, and nonequilibrium thermodynamics, can convey a sound understanding of the laws and dynamics that govern the evolution of complex systems in the various realms of investigation.... The basic notions of this new discipline can be developed to give an adequate account of the dynamical evolution of human societies as well. Such an account could furnish the basis of a system of knowledge better able to orient human beings and societies in their rapidly changing milieu."

"Progressively higher levels of organization are attained as catalytic cycles on one level interlock and form hypercycles: these are systems on a higher level of organization. Thus molecules emerge from a combination of chemically active atoms; protocells emerge from sequences of complex molecules; eukaryotic cells emerge among the prokaryotes; metazoa make their appearance among the protozoa and converge in still higher-level ecological and social systems."

"Underlying the diversified and localized gross layers of ordinary consciousness there is a unified, nonlocalized, and subtle layer: “pure consciousness.”"

"As we have already glimpsed and will continue to discover, we are able to expand our awareness beyond the perceived limitations of our own person and access the dimensions of a transpersonal consciousness. As we open ourselves to the realization of the in-formed universe, this shift in our collective awareness heralds a resolution of the schisms that have divided us for so long—both among and within us"

"General systems theory is the scientific exploration of "wholes" and "wholeness" which, not so long ago, were considered metaphysical notions transcending the boundaries of science. Hierarchic structure, stability, teleology, differentiation, approach to and maintenance of steady states, goal-directedness — these are a few of such general system properties."

"Systems philosophy first must find out the "nature of the beast" This is the question of what is meant by "system", and how systems are realized in reality in various levels of observation. In Laslo's terms, this is the methodology and theory of natural systems. Secondly, there is epistemology, i.e. the methodology and theory of cognitive systems."

"Each system has a specific structure made up of certain maintained relationships among its parts, and manifests irreducible characteristics of its own."

"Yet while they exist, regardless of how long, each system has a specific structure made up of certain maintained relationships among its parts, and manifests irreducible characteristics of its own."

"A system in one perspective is a subsystem in another. But the systems view always treats systems as integrated wholes of their subsidiary components and never as the mechanistic aggregate of parts in isolable causal relations."

"The systems view is the emerging contemporary view of organized complexity, one step beyond the Newtonian view of organized simplicity, and two steps beyond the classical world views of divinely ordered or imaginatively envisaged complexity."

"Early scientific thinking was holistic, but speculative -- the modern scientific temper reacted by being empirical, but atomistic. Neither is free from error, the former because it replaces factual inquiry with faith and insight, and the latter because it sacrifices coherence at the altar of facticity. We witness today another shift in ways of thinking: the shift toward rigorous but holistic theories. This means thinking in terms of facts and events in the context of wholes, forming integrated sets with their own properties and relationships,"

"Even the brain, that most delicate and complex of all known organs, is not merely a lot of neurons added together. While a genius must have more of the gray matter than a sparrow, the idiot may have just as much as the genius. The difference between them must be explained in terms of how those substances are organized."

"Now "cybernetics" is the term coined by Wiener to denote "steersmanship" or the science of control. Although current engineering usage restricts it to the study of flows in closed systems, it can be taken in a wider context, as the study of processes interrelating systems with inputs and outputs, and their structural-dynamic structure. It is in this wider sense that "cybernetics" will be used here, to wit, as system-cybernetics, understanding by "system" an ordered whole in relation to its relevant environment (hence one actually or potentially open)."

"There is nothing supernatural about the process of self-organization to states of higher entropy; it is a general property of systems, regardless of their materials and origin. It does not violate the Second Law of thermodynamics since the decrease in entropy within an open system is always offset by the increase of entropy in its surroundings."

"Systems at each level of integration function as wholes with respect to their parts and parts with respect to higher level wholes."

"Opposed to atomism and behaviorism, the systems view of man links him again with the world he lives in, for he is seen as emerging in that world and reflecting its general character."

"In the contemporary systems view man is not a sui generis phenomenon that can be studied without regard to other things. He is a natural entity, and an inhabitant of several interrelated worlds. By origin he is a biological organism. By work and play he is a social role carrier. And by conscious personality he is a Janus-faced link integrating and coordinating the biological and the social worlds. Man is, in the final analysis, a coordinating interface system in the multilevel hierarchy of nature."

"Imagine a universe made up not of things in space and in time, but of patterned flows extending throughout its reaches. What flows is a mysterious, nonindividualized something we call energy. It flows along pathways structured by the metric of integral space-time. It flows smoothly, without crinks or wrinkles, over vast stretches of this cosmic matrix, and it becomes contorted in some regions."

"In some regions, under especially favorable conditions, the level of organization reaches that of enormously heavy organic substances, such as protein molecules and nucleic acids. Now the basic building blocks are given for the constitution of self-replicating units of still higher organizational level: cells. These systems maintain a constant flow of substances through their structures, imposing on it a steady-state with specific parameters. The inputs and outputs may achieve coordination with analogous units in the surrounding medium, and we are on our way toward multicellular phenomena. The resulting structures — organisms — are likewise steady-state patterns imposed steady-state patterns imposed on a continuous flow... The organic systems themselves, define the supra-organic (ecological or social) community. Ultimately the strands of communication straddle the space-time region within which the primary systems have come together, and those of its layers which provide conditions favorable to such structuration become organized as systems in their own right. We reach the level of the global (ecological, and on earth also sociocultural) system."

"Evolution may not “drive” toward humanoid qualities at all, even if it uses them under rather special circumstances. What evolution may be up to could be merely the continuing structuration of the biosphere through increased levels of communication between systems of one level, resulting in more integrated supersystems on the next."

"The systems view of nature and man is clearly non- anthropocentric, but it is not non-humanistic for all that. It allows us to understand that man is one species of system in a complex and embracing hierarchy of nature, and at the same time it tells us that all systems have value and intrinsic worth. They are goal-oriented, self-maintaining, and self-creating expressions of nature's penchant for order and adjustment. The status of man is not lessened by admitting the amoeba as his kin, nor by recognizing that sociocultural systems are his supersystems. Seeing himself as a connecting link in a complex natural hierarchy cancels man's anthropocentrism, but seeing the hierarchy itself as an expression of self-ordering and self-creating nature bolsters his self-esteem and encourages his humanism."

"We may not be the center of the universe and the telos of evolution, but we are concrete embodiments of cosmic processes in their particular terrestrial variation. And, albeit accidentally, we did happen to evolve a most remarkable property: self -reflection. In virtue of this we may be among the very few species of natural systems in the universe which are able not only to sense the world and respond to it, but to know their own sensations and come to reasoned conclusions about the nature of the universe. To be a man is thus to have the almost unique opportunity of getting to know oneself and the world in which one lives. It is surely shortsighted to disregard this opportunity and confine oneself solely to the business of living. A failure to exploit our capability for rational knowledge is, moreover, contrary to the business of living."

"The natural philosophy of the new developments in the sciences is a systems philosophy. When properly articulated, it can give us both factual and normative knowledge. Exploring such knowledge and applying it in determining our future is an opportunity we cannot afford to miss. For if we do not, another chapter of terrestrial evolution will come to an end, and its unique experiment with rational consciousness will be written off as a failure."

"The search for meaning is not limited to science: it is constant and continuous--all of us engage in it during all our waking hours the search continues even in our dreams. There are many ways of finding meaning, and there are no absolute boundaries separating them."

"One can find meaning in poetry as well as in science in the contemplations of a flower as well as in the grasp of an equation. We can be filled with wonder as we stand under the majestic dome of the night sky and see the myriad lights that twinkle and shine in its seemingly infinite depths. We can also be filled wit awe as we behold the meaning of the formulae that define the propagation of light in space, the formation of galaxies, the synthesis of chemical elements, and the relation of energy, mass and velocity in the physical universe. The mystical perception of oneness and the religious intuition of a Divine intelligence are as much a construction of meaning as the postulation of the universal law of gravitation."

"In the penultimate decade of the twentieth century science is sufficiently advanced to resolve the puzzles that stymied scientists in the last century and demonstrate, without metaphysical speculation, the consistency of evolution in all realms of experience. It is now possible to advance a general evolution theory based on unitary and mutually consistent concepts derived from the empirical sciences."

"A new level of organization means a simplification of system function, and of the corresponding system structure, it also means the initiation of a process of progressive structural and functional complexification."

"Just as organic species evolve toward the use of greater densities of a wider variety of free-energy sources in their environment, so human societies develop to access, store, and use in greater densities larger quantities of free energy through the ongoing improvement of their technologies. As a consequence societies, the same as natural systems, tend to grow larger in size, develop more intricate relations among their diverse components, and create more massive and flexible modes of interaction among them."

"The beginning of the twentieth century witnessed the breakdown of the mechanistic theory even within physics, the science where it was the most successful... Relativity took over in field physics, and the science of quantum theory in microphysics... In view of parallel developments in physics, chemistry, biology, sociology, and economics, many branches of the contemporary sciences became... ‘sciences of organized complexity’ — that is, systems sciences."

"The worldview of the classical sciences conceptualized nature as a giant machine composed of intricate but replaceable machine-like parts. The new systems sciences look at nature as an organism endowed with irreplaceable elements and an innate but non-deterministic purpose for choice, for flow, for spontaneity."

"The classical worldview was atomistic and individualistic; it viewed objects as separate from their environments and people as separate from each other and from their surroundings. The systems view perceives connections and communications between people, and between people and nature, and emphasizes community and integrity in both the natural and the human world."

"When the classical worldview was applied to social science, the dominant notions turned out to be struggle for survival, the profit of the individual, with at best an assumed automatic coincidence of individual and societal good (through Adam Smith's "invisible hand"). When the systemic vision inspires the theories of social science, the values of competition are mitigated by those of cooperation, and the emphasis on individualistic work ethos is tempered with a tolerance of diversity and of experimentation with institutions and practices that foster man-man and man- nature adaptation and harmony."

"Cultures are, in the final analysis, value-guided systems."

"Independent of biological need fulfillment and the reproductive needs of the species, cultures] satisfy not bodily needs, but values. Values define cultural man's need for rationality, meaningfulness in emotional experience, richness of imagination, and depth of faith. All cultures respond to such supra-biological values. But in what form they do so depends on the specific kind of values people happen to have."

"Values are goals which behavior strives to realize. Any activity that is oriented towards an end is a value-oriented action. To the ancient Greeks, their culture was guided by an attainment of ‘the good life.’ In the early days of Christianity, the ‘good life’ was shifted from this lifetime into the next. Newtonian science and the modern era brought values under rational scrutiny, and a desire for empirical order. Modern capitalism introduced the value of ‘good’ as more production per capita, and ‘better’ as even more production. There is nothing in the sphere of culture which would exempt us from the realm of values—no facts floating around, ready to be grasped without valuations and expectations"

"Systemicity is imposed as a set of rules binding the parts among themselves. But these rules do not constrain the parts to act in one way and one way only; they merely prescribe that certain types of functions are carried out in certain sequences. The parts have options; as long as a sufficient number of sufficiently qualified units carry out the prescribed tasks, the requirements of systemic determination are met."

"In systems such as contemporary society, evolution is always a promise and devolution is always a threat. No system comes with a guarantee of ongoing evolution. The challenge is real. To ignore it is to play dice with all we have. To accept it is not to play God—it is to become an instrument of whatever divine purpose infuses the universe."

"Evolving our consciousness is not something we do only for ourselves — it is something we do also for others... for all others, and for the Earth. Because when we open up and let our body and mind feel our ties with others and with nature, we change ourselves, and change others around us. When a sufficient number of people pray or meditate together, or find another path to evolve their consciousness, other people are affected as well. More sick people heal, divorce and suicide rates drop, crime and violence diminish. When many people open up, a powerful force develops — a leap of consciousness takes place. All the great prophets and sages of history knew this, Jesus as well as the Buddha, Mohammed as well as Zoroaster — and more recently the same as Sri Aurobindo, Teilhard de Chardin and the Dalai Lama."

"The evolution of our individual consciousness paves the way toward the evolution of our collective consciousness. This individual-collective evolution, more than anything else, can and must change this world."

"We are beginning to see the entire universe as a holographically interlinked network of energy and information, organically whole and self referential at all scales of its existence. We, and all things in the universe, are non-locally connected with each other and with all other things in ways that are unfettered by the hitherto known limitations of space and time."

"The power of our intention and the energy it unleashes are dependent on our levels of coherence and intensity. The affirmation of our positive intentions in thought, feeling and action increases the power of our abilities. Nonetheless, it is important to appreciate that the matrix of physical, emotional, and mental levels of consciousness through which our personal and collective intentions and choices are explored and experienced require a “health warning” on interpreting the Law of Attraction too simplistically."

"Where Wilber outlined what an integral theory of everything should look like, Laszlo actually created one."

"I think it’s obvious that Wagner’s anti-Semitic views and writings are monstrous. There is no way around that. And I must say that if I, in a naïvely sentimental way, try to think which of the great composers of the past I would love to spend twenty-four hours with, if I could, Wagner doesn’t come to mind. I’d love to follow Mozart around for twenty-four hours; I’m sure it would be very entertaining, amusing, edifying, but Wagner… Wagner? I might invite him to dinner for study purposes, but not for enjoyment. Wagner, the person, is absolutely appalling, despicable, and, in a way, very difficult to put together with the music he wrote, which so often has exactly the opposite kind of feelings. It is noble, generous, etc. But now we are entering into the whole discussion of whether it is moral or not and this becomes too involved in a discussion. But suffice it to say for now that Wagner’s anti-Semitism was monstrous. That he used a lot of, at the time, common terminology for what could be described as salon anti-Semitism, and that he had all sorts of rationalizations about it, does not make it any less monstrous. He also used some abominable phrases which can be, at best, interpreted as being said in the heat of the moment — that Jews should be burned, etc. Whether he meant these things figuratively or not can be discussed. The fact remains that he was a monstrous anti-Semite. How we would look at the monstrous anti-Semitism without the Nazis, I don’t know. One thing I do know is that they, the Nazis, used, misused, and abused Wagner’s ideas or thoughts — I think this has to be said — beyond what he might have had in mind. Anti-Semitism was not invented by Adolf Hitler and it was certainly not invented by Richard Wagner. It existed for generations and generations and centuries before. The difference between National Socialism and the earlier forms of anti-Semitism is that the Nazis were the first, to my knowledge, to evolve a systematic plan to exterminate the Jews, the whole people. And I don’t think, although Wagner’s anti-Semitism is monstrous, that he can be made responsible for that, even though a lot of the Nazi thinkers, if you want to call them that, often quoted Wagner as their precursor. It also needs to be said for clarity’s sake that, in the operas themselves, there is not one Jewish character. There is not one anti-Semitic remark. There is nothing in any one of the ten great operas of Wagner even remotely approaching a character like Shylock."

"I must tell you, that when I came back from Ramallah in September, I really felt I had done something good. For many of these Palestinian children, it was the first time they ever had a positive thought about anything to do with Israel. I asked one young girl, 'Are you glad I came?'. And she said, 'Yes, because until now I only saw Israeli tanks and Israeli soldiers, and now I see an Israeli musician'"

"The Declaration of Independence was a source of inspiration to believe in ideals that transformed us from Jews to Israelis. ... I am asking today with deep sorrow: Can we, despite all our achievements, ignore the intolerable gap between what the Declaration of Independence promised and what was fulfilled, the gap between the idea and the realities of Israel? Does the condition of occupation and domination over another people fit the Declaration of Independence? Is there any sense in the independence of one at the expense of the fundamental rights of the other? Can the Jewish people whose history is a record of continued suffering and relentless persecution, allow themselves to be indifferent to the rights and suffering of a neighboring people? Can the State of Israel allow itself an unrealistic dream of an ideological end to the conflict instead of pursuing a pragmatic, humanitarian one based on social justice. I believe that despite all the objective and subjective difficulties, the future of Israel and its position in the family of enlightened nations will depend on our ability to realize the promise of the founding fathers as they canonized it in the Declaration of Independence. I have always believed that there is no military solution to the Jewish Arab conflict, neither from a moral nor a strategic one and since a solution is therefore inevitable I ask myself, why wait?"

"Despite the fact that as an art, music cannot compromise its principles, and politics, on the other hand, is the art of compromise, when politics transcends the limits of the present existence and ascents to the higher sphere of the possible, it can be joined there by music. Music is the art of the imaginary par excellence, an art free of all limits imposed by words, an art that touches the depth of human existence, and art of sounds that crosses all borders. As such, music can take the feelings and imagination of Israelis and Palestinians to new unimaginable spheres."

"I am a Palestinian ..… and an Israeli … So you see it is possible to be both. … Everyone has to understand that the Palestinian cause is a just cause therefore it can be only given justice if it is achieved without violence. Violence can only weaken the righteousness of the Palestinian cause."

"Every musician here has played these pieces many times, sometimes hundreds of times. Yesterday we looked at this music as if we had seen it for the first time. We never accept that the next note will played the same way it was played before. Thinking anew is our daily activity. I hope all the people of this region can take note of that."

"To have real knowledge, one must understand the essence of things and not only their manifestations."

"Music has the capacity to create a greater reality."

"The thing about Wagner is we’re always wrong about him, because he always embraces opposites … There are things in his operas which viewed one way are naturalistic, and viewed another way are symbolic, but the problem is you can’t represent both views on stage at once."

"I have lived as a Jew in Berlin for the past 23 years, something that would not have been possible if I did not believe that the Germans had thought long and hard about their past. No one else has managed to do this to the extent the Germans have, and I admire them for it."

"Israel's lasting future depends on its government's willingness to enter into a genuine peace agreement with the Palestinians. That this also goes for the Palestinians grouped around Hamas hardly needs to be stressed. Both sides have to understand that they must live together for better or worse and that hatred, terror and territorial, ethnic and religious exclusion have never produced peace, but rather have led to killing and more killing."

"considered the principle of equality and the pursuit of peace as the bedrock of the society they were building. What happened? ... I still believe that despite all the objective and subjective difficulties, the future of Israel and its position in the family of enlightened nations will depend on our ability to realize the promise of the founding fathers as they canonized it in the Declaration of Independence. Yet, nothing has really changed since 2004. Instead, we now have a law that confirms the Arab population as . It therefore is a very clear form of apartheid. I don’t think the Jewish people survived for 20 centuries, mostly through persecution and enduring endless cruelties, in order to now become the oppressors, inflicting cruelty on others. This new law does exactly that. That is why I am ashamed of being an Israeli today."

"I live in Germany with great concern. Today, there is a highly dangerous new anti-Semitism in Germany, and reactions to this fact, both in society and politics, are far too weak. In the early 1990s I would not have believed that anti-Semitism and xenophobia, glorification of the Nazi past and an aggressive, racial nationalism could become socially acceptable again in Germany in 2019. What is happening every day in Germany cannot be brushed away as “alarm signals”; it is far too late for those. We must condemn and countermand anti-Semitism and xenophobia roundly and jointly, every day. For there are many aspects of German culture I value greatly: literature, music and philosophy, for example. Nazism, however, does not represent the human values this German culture is founded upon. Nazism is inhuman. Before I end, permit me to say a few words on another subject which fills me with concern: in Israel, it is currently unclear how the next government will be formed. No matter how the new government turns out, however, Israelis must finally understand that their own security is inextricably linked to justice for the Palestinian people, which is so urgently needed. There can only be true and lasting peace if the unjust occupation of the Palestinian territories finally ends."

"His exceptional musical talent was already evident then and he has since developed into one of the the preeminent conductors of our time"

"I'm sure that there are many Israelis who dream of waking up one day to find the Palestinians gone. And there are many Palestinians who dream of going to bed at night and waking up the next morning to find the Israelis gone."

"I have the greatest respect for the survivors of the Holocaust. We can't even imagine what these people went through. And yet even they have differing positions … I respect that there are survivors who can't, and certainly don't want to, listen to this music. But I don't accept that the fact that an orchestra playing Wagner in Tel Aviv or Jerusalem would do any harm to someone sitting in an apartment in Haifa."

"Wagner exploited all forms of expression at a composer's disposal -- harmony, dynamics, orchestration -- to the extreme. His music is highly emotional, and at the same time Wagner has extraordinary control over the effect he achieves. That's why there is also something manipulative about Wagner's music, which is not to say that it's not honest. In fact, I believe that it's totally honest, but it also happens to be manipulative."

"I think classical music is a great, beautiful art as long as people recognize it. But first we need to calm down and listen to it with heart. In this technologically advanced time, too many things are drawing peoples' attention. Sometimes we need to slow down, look back and feel the beauty of art and life."

"I started lessons when I was three and a half. In the beginning I just played a little but, when I was five, I played my first recital, and from that point my parents had high hopes for me; especially my father."

"I'd play the piano at 5am."

"Charity is just like music which comes from deep inside my heart. I can express my love for society and my country through my fingers, just like Chopin did."

"My emotions are expressed through the piano. It’s easier to speak through the keys than through words."

"My fans really love me, so they want to understand classical music and I want to help them. By watching me, they’ve learnt not to clap between the movements, to know some of the music I play quite well. I love the idea of playing quiet music on a big stage, you can feel every note bubbling in the air, with everybody following."

"I’m very happy that so many children are learning the piano because of me."

"I'm inspiring a new generation who are hungry to learn music. I think that's my responsibility and it's my dream."

"美食其实也能吃出音乐的感受来。比如像法国作曲家拉威尔的经典钢琴曲《水的嬉戏》，最后一句就像香槟的气泡消失一样。"

"Infant prodigies do not necessarily become great musicians. I have had over three thousand pupils, and I am convinced that the proficiency which some display is no more than a manifestation of dexterity and an extraordinary natural imitative faculty of children."

"The musician's technique, in fact, should be as protean as the actor's. The best method of attaining this is by combining the qualities of the artist and the technician. To do this it is essential, that in addition to concentrating upon musical technique, one should keep in touch with the other arts. They provide that general culture to the musician without which he will never become a great artist."

"It seems to me that this last piece, The Poet Speaks, which is the title Schumann gave to this immortal work, should be a transition into a kind of intimate reverie. It is not just about making a beautiful sound and expressive phrasing. You also need to create a sense of dreaming. The truth is, you need to dream this piece, rather than play it. Will you allow me to take your place? These two phrases are not connected. They are two different elements… of the same musical state. Here, like a question… And here again, another, tenderly asking the way. And from this moment, you should convey the music not just through the notes but through some kind of inspiration drawn from its immortal spirit. Now the sonorities should fade away…grow fainter and dimmer…and you are left simply in the presence of a reminiscent dream."

"Russian students? you ask. Yes, we have white Russians but not the Soviets. They have a wonderful school of their own which has produced superb musicians such as Sviatoslav Richter, Oistrakh, and Rostropovich. Those Russians that we have here chose freedom, but their Slavic temperament manifests itself just the same, and they have a marked talent for music."

"That's right. And the time when Cortot came to Vienna in 1947 remains one of my greatest pianistic memories. He came there to play for the first time after the War, and we all knew what the war had been for him, what his ideological engagement had been. Cortot played two programs. The first part of the first recital, how shall I say this... it was an absolute disaster. Cortot played Chopin's Fantasy, which is not very difficult from a technical point of view, but he didn't manage to play even one octave correctly. Jörg Demus was seated next to me, and he was seething: "My goodness, how is this possible? He's an amateur, I'm leaving at intermission!" After the intermission, however, Cortot came back on stage like a changed man. It was a different man, a different pianist. He had gotten ahold of himself. I couldn't believe how well he played the Sonata Op. 35 No. 2, which is such a perilous piece by comparison. At the end of the concert, with Gulda, we found Demus and tried to convince him that he had missed a major event: "That's impossible! I don't believe you – and I already sold my ticket for the second recital!" [laughs] In the end, we weren't able to convince him. A week later, in front of a sold-out house, with all three of us in attendance, Cortot played the 24 Preludes and the Kreisleriana. I can tell you that he went far beyond, in terms of depth, poetry, and spontaneity, all the recordings he had ever made of these pieces, which we knew so well. It was a revelation! It was so moving! All the pianists who were there agreed. When Cortot and Fischer were on the right foot, it was perfect, in terms of the cleanness of their playing, and not just from an emotional or spiritual point of view..."

"Alfred Cortot was always a controversial pianist. Some listeners revered his playing, particularly of Chopin, as the embodiment of essential Gallic virtues, intelligence, clarity and elegance. Others thought it pallid, mannered and inaccurate, particularly in his later years."

"The outstanding exponent of the French school after Pugno was Alfred Cortot, a remarkable and unusual pianist. … After graduating from the Conservatoire, Cortot plunged into the musical life of Europe, and not only as a pianist. … How could he possibly find time to keep his fingers in shape? The answer is simple: he didn't. Cortot was always making mistakes or having memory slips. These would have been fatal with a lesser man. With Cortot they made no difference. One accepted them, as one accepts scars or defects in a painting by an old master. … There was in his playing a combination of intellectual authority, aristocracy, masculinity and poetry. Cortot had a unique style, and a Cortot performance could always (and still can be recognized from his records; he made hundreds) by its sharpness, point, clarity of line, unmistakable rubato, sheer intelligence—yes, and by its wrong notes, too."

"Sofronitsky was made for Scriabin, and Scriabin for Sofronitsky!"

"How do I produce the effects which I obtain from the piano? … In answer I would say I produce them by listening, criticizing, judging—working over the point, until I get it as I want it. Then I can reproduce it at will, if I want to make just the same effect; but sometimes I want to change and try another."

"Mr. Backhaus rarely used a percussive touch, and only for a special reason. One might listen to recital after recital without hearing a single unbeautiful tone."

"Backhaus was a wonderful pianist, not really representative of the German style. About him I can speak with real enthusiasm. He was more relaxed than most of them. I once heard him play the Chopin etudes and it was remarkable. In the first one in C major not a single note fell under the piano. It was fantastic. He heard me play Liszt's Feux follets and came up to me. “Horowitz,” he said, “I could never do that." But he was being nice. He could have if he wanted. I have often been asked what I consider the most difficult piece I have ever played. I can answer that quickly. It was Feux follets. The Liszt Don Juan is not an easy piece, either."

"Ever since the time when the feat of playing whole programs without the notes originated among the great virtuosi of the first half of the nineteenth century, musical memory has occupied an important place in piano playing and in all serious piano study. Today the frequenters of concert-halls have come to take it quite for granted that all public performers on the instrument shall play from memory, so much so in fact that to have seen Vladimir de Pachmann with the notes of the Chopin F minor Concerto in front of him on the music-rack, or the late Raoul Pugno tripping gaily out onto the platform with the music of the Italian Concerto in his hand, was to have experienced a slight shock to one's accustomed sense of the fitness of things. Entirely aside from any feeling among the artists themselves as to the advantages or disadvantages of playing from memory, their audiences have quite decided that they want their Beethoven, Schumann, Chopin, Liszt, and all the rest performed without reference to the printed page, so that it well behooves the young aspirant for public pianistic honors to question himself about the quality of his musical memory."

"I think Michelangeli in some repertory is absolutely incredible, especially Debussy."

"Interesting pianist, but I think he is just a little bit meshuga."

"He's a real perfectionist. But I think that this fanaticism and and the extreme instrumental standards he set for himself prevent his imagination from taking flight and stop him expressing any real love for the work he's performing so impeccably. It's 'inspiration' that's missing. Is this a notion that's been banished from today's dictionaries? It would be a great shame if this were so. But – one doesn't judge a master."

"If there is an Italian school, it is represented by the puzzling and redoubtable figure of Arturo Benedetti Michelangeli, the most important Italian pianist after Busoni (if Busoni be considered Italian). Purely as a playing machine, Michelangeli is a legend to his colleagues, who put him in the Horowitz class as a super-virtuoso. Some of his playing is startling in its sheer pianistic polish and perfection. His fingers can no more hit a wrong note or smudge a passage than a bullet can be veered off course once it has been fired. In addition he is a complete master of tonal application, as evidenced in his performance of Gaspard de la nuit. By any standards this is one of the triumphs of modern pianism. The puzzling part about Michelangeli is that in many pieces of the romantic repertoire he seems unsure of himself emotionally, and his otherwise direct playing is then laden with expressive devices that disturb the musical flow."

"["How was he when the concerts were over?"] Sometimes he resembled children in having fun with few things. He was essential in this too. But his greatest passion, outside of music, were racing cars. He drove a Ferrari. One day he took me from Moncalieri, where he taught courses, to Turin in his car. He darted through the streets. I was terrified. And he didn't say anything; he was like a statue, dead serious. He looked like Buster Keaton. When we stopped in front of the station, he turned his bird-like head and opened his mouth: "Don't tell me I have scared you""

"Emil Sauer was also a good pianist, good technique, style. Very good fingers. He was a Liszt pupil. He was at his best in salon music — Chopin waltzes, things like that. But I heard him play a very good, very correct Op. 109. Some of the Liszt pupils were horrible. One I never could understand was Siloti. He played very badly. Another Liszt pupil was the famous Moriz Rosenthal, and I hated his playing. He couldn't make one nice phrase. I don't understand how he got his fame. Perhaps when I heard him he was too old to have any control. He had dexterity but he had no real technique, and I don't think he really knew how to play the piano. He didn't make music."

"During his recital last night I experienced so many contradictory emotions that it is difficult to define them. In the first instance, a profound joy when I realized that this artist had not altered (and I believe he never will). Nothing in his playing or attitude betrays his [nearly] eighty years loaded with success and achievement. At the same time I felt a great sadness. How is it possible that Emil Sauer must play in the small Salle Erard, despite his glorious past, when a Brailowsky or Uninsky can pack the Salle Pleyel? It must be due to public opinion, which remains eternally superficial, dependent on trends made fashionable by snobbery and publicity. In the case of Sauer, there may be another explanation - it is as strange as it is sad to reflect that the present generation has never heard of him, while his own generation has faded away. No matter how paradoxical it may seem this is the truth. Emil Sauer, the international virtuoso and pupil of Franz Liszt, is being forced, at the end of a brilliant career, to attempt to make a 'name' for himself. Such, at least, is the situation in France!"

"I heard Edwin Fischer, who did not mean much to me. I heard another pianist in Berlin who had a big success and I thought he was awful — Mischa Levitzki. Just fingers, and you cannot listen only to fingers. There is a difference between artist and artisan. Levitzki was an artisan."

"Of the Russian pianists I like only one, Richter. Gilels did some things well, but I did not like his mannerisms, the way he moved around while he was playing."

"He [Gilels] played in an easy, natural manner, with strong but unassuming musicianship. His technique was brilliant; years later Neuhaus, still astonished, was to recall Gilels's incredible octaves in Liszt's Spanish Rhapsody. Yet Gilels was never looked upon as a mere virtuoso. As a matter of fact, his programs did not often include music pour epater le bourgeois. He played a stedy diet of Beethoven (the Hammerklavier was a work that strongly engaged his last years), Schubert, Schumann, Chopin and Brahms. In many respects, the great virtuoso who put his authoritative stamp on whatever he played was, at the same time, a thinking man's pianist."

"Maria Veniaminovna Yudina was a monstre sacré. I knew her, but only from afar – it has to be said that she was so odd that everyone avoided her. For her own part, she showed herself somewhat suspicious and critical of me. She said of me: ‘Richter? Hmm… As a pianist, he’s good for Rachmaninoff.’ From her lips, that wasn’t a compliment, even though she herself occasionally played Rachmaninoff. She had graduated from the Petrograd Conservatory in the early twenties, at the same time as Vladimir Sofronitsky – a giant of a man who played Schumann and Debussy magnificently and Scriabin like nobody else. By the end of her life Yudina was an outrageous figure, a sort of Clytemnestra, always dressed in black and wearing sneakers for her concerts. She was immensely talented and a keen advocate of the music of her own time: she played Stravinsky, whom she loved, Hindemith, Krenek and Bartók at a time when these composers were not only unknown in the Soviet Union but effectively banned. And when she played Romantic music, it was impressive – except that she didn’t play what was written. Liszt’s Weinen und Klagen was phenomenal, but Schubert’s B-flat major Sonata, while arresting as an interpretation, was the exact opposite of what it should have been, and I remember a performance of the Second Chopin Nocturne that was so heroic that it no longer sounded like a piano but a trumpet. It was no longer Schubert or Chopin, but Yudina."

"During the war she had given The Well-Tempered Clavier at a splendid concert, even if she polished off the contemplative Prelude in B-flat minor from Book Two at a constant fortissimo. At the end of the concert, Neuhaus, whom I was accompanying, went to congratulate her in her dressing-room. 'But, Maria Veniaminovna,' he asked her, 'why did you play the B-flat minor Prelude in such a dramatic way?' 'Because we are at war!' It was typical of Yudina. 'We’re at war!' She absolutely had to bring the war into Bach."

"She also used to wander around with a revolver, which she would show to all and sundry. It really was a bit much. She used to say: 'Hold this thing for me, but be careful, it’s loaded.’ One day she developed a crush on someone who didn’t return her advances. One can understand why; he must have been terrified of her. And so she challenged him to a duel. By the end of her concerts I always used to have a headache. She subjected her audiences to such a degree of intensity, an incredible intensity! And then there was her way of coming onstage; you had the impression she was walking through the rain. And she carried a crucifix and crossed herself before launching into the first note. I’ve nothing against this, but in Soviet Russia, at that time!… Of course, she cared for the poor, took them in and lived like a tramp herself. An eccentric woman and an extraordinary artist, but someone who always felt the need to invent things… Even so, I played at her funeral. Rachmaninoff."

"The critics are occasionally pleased to compliment a pianist by saying that he plays in the grand style. Exactly what do they mean by that phrase? In the broadest sense, they mean a style of playing which penetrates deeper than the physical conquering of the piano. It concerns itself with the release of music. The “grand style” moved listeners through interpretation."

"Any artist worth his salt thinks music far more than he practices. Practice divides the mind between music and the mechanics of managing hands and feet. Inward hearing has its roots in musical thought."

"I am startled, occasionally, to find “intelligence” used as the antithesis of “feeling”, as though the two played against each other. Nothing could be further from the truth. No intelligent interpretation is lacking in emotional values. What this probably means is that, depending on gifts and degree of maturity, some natures emphasize brain over heart. Where such an imbalance occurs, it must be corrected by conscious and concentrated application to emotional content. If an interpretation is unduly cerebral, liveness and color can be infused into it by attention to whether the theme is now in the right hand, now in the left; whether it is supported by an accompaniment which has significance of its own, or merely hums along."

"Like nearly all of the Leschetizky pupils, he represented the last vestiges of romanticism as it was actually practiced in the romantic period — which means pliancy, a perpetually singing line, concentration on inner voices and a free approach and a free approach to the notes. In Moiseiwitsch's case, freedom was always tempered by impeccable musicality."

"Sometimes I think someone upstairs saved me from being ordinary."

"Deep shock and sadness I heard the sad news, Zoltán Kocsis passed away. He was a musical giant, one of the rare geniuses. His impact on our whole generation is immeasurable. The Budapest Festival Orchestra on behalf and in my own name sincerely farewell track from co-founding partner, from the many common music production partner and unforgettable musician, a role model. May he rest in peace."

"I'm not the person who looks back or looks forward. I try to live in what is now."

"That means a lot, it goes from generation to generation, and you can't wonder why, and I think it's because it's such a good energy in it, and I think the girls and boys, they want to dress like us, and they want to sing along."

"I think I was more like the black sheep, maybe, that, I was someone that you could blame on, but we were actually agreed on, that we had to stop now, because we came to a point, when it doesn't feel good anymore."

"Why should we do it? We have done so many songs, during such a long time. The fact that we had two divorces, and there was no meaning, I think, with getting together, again."

"I have been described as a very mysterious human being and that hurts a little bit, because it's not like that at all."

"I think to look in the future, to plan another one, it's not realistic right now. But I don't close any doors. I'm very open for what comes up. At the moment, we are so happy with this one. I really hope people will like it as much as we do."

"Moravec gave me this recording ages ago, but only now have I found the time and inclination to listen to it. I've no desire to pick holes in his interpretation and, when all's said and done, there's really nothing to pick holes in. These two sonatas aren't a part of my repertory, so I can listen to them purely for my own enjoyment (an enjoyment guaranteed, of course, by the composer). Moravec is an altogether admirable and professional pianist. He understands what he's playing."

"Countries, borders and flags build walls between all of us. Music can break them down and unite us.""

"You become a slave to the song. It (recording and producing a song) becomes a spiritual experience.""

"You always have what it takes, otherwise, it wouldn’t have taken you!""

"I love people and building bridges between them. There is nothing as fascinating as human nature, except the gloriously vague expression on the face of a cat.""

"It’s always just about the music. I’ve got to be true to who I am. Music is my religion. My way of communicating. When I write a song, I feel like the music is coming through me. It’s a beautiful experience to write a song that becomes something that has an influence on other peoples’ lives.""

"Having performed ... in front of audiences in twenty different countries, I’ve noticed how certain melodies have the ability to connect and uplift both the audience and the musicians. I’m privileged to present these timeless classics with a group of excellent artists who share my attitude of putting the creation of beautiful, entertaining music above all else.""

"Music has always been an “exhilarating exploration of the world and my soul""

"Raised and doped with illusion - Download god. I know I'm in trouble when I'm seeing double. Come on, make me scream!"

"You could thrill me. You could kiss me. You could kill me. You could miss me."

"Like a crushed piece of flesh on the boiling motorway: No beginning like the end, the great, grand end with your face in the sand."

"Fall into the sun. Oh, be one. Oh, be gone."

"Your flaming tongue strikes again like the insect's deadly flight into the light, bright, holy white. I crave your kissing bite. Oh, fool me."

"Sisyphus cracked the rock and built himself a big, big castle. Now he runs up and down the stairs, longing to be blessed with pain again"

"I see you shiver in the wind. Catch your thoughts, seal my mind. Visionary - breaking down walls of ice and stone and time and thought."

"Time rushes by. Some blur memories, then we fly."

"When she walked through me, all I could do was watch and say "Hey, hey-hey, hey"."

"Have you laughed your laughs, my friend? Will you ever fall in love again?"

"Crawling on your knees through the desert sand. Your dress is torn and blood on your hand. The Southern Cross, a giant tower of light. Your silhouette, your laughter - then your bite! I feel real."

"The world's all gone to pieces - Hangin' upside down. You might as well deep-freeze us until the cure is found. And every time the sun - And every time the sun, that blazing, callous gun, will rise again."

"Thinking of your smile makes me crawl for a mile through the rain, you know."

"Nothing we can't buy: rhino-horn with ham"

"Give your heart to the devil - you get a cell phone for free, yah! Bigger, faster and louder - Pretend we cannot see"

"A craving for the haven that is on no maps"

"Oceans of time passing through space, beings and things – come and slip away. Like tears in a stream drift into the sea, no shape, no soul – faint memories of dreams."

"I’m going down in the 7th round of this fight that I thought was just a joke."

"Sunny’s with him on the run - his friend Sunny is a gun."

"To be able to run you gotta learn how to walk with these demons inside."

"Countries, borders, anthems and flags keep us apart those ancient gags. All their speeches, adverts and hymns to feed their greed and keep us dim. Call me insane, call me brave, but I won't slave for the pharaoh's grave. I’d rather dance my life away for this could be our final day."

"Limousines and pearls - she wants to rule the world. Assassins in the brain - the white light leaves no stain. Money in his hand - waiting for the man, who’ll steal his soul away. This is our last dance!"

"Tonight, I saw a star breaking through the clouds, oblivious to its light – just like you."

"His thoughts are flowing like a straightened river into the ocean."

"Every day that you’re gone, I think of you. The colours of your portrait never dry."

"When your eyes are shut, you start seeing in ways that we’ve always known! Living so many ways of shaping these days - and feel those rays warm the skin on our face."

"Holding on to the same old ground, when all inside is screaming ‘out’!"

"Our mirrors are you and me and through them, we learn to see."

"All these days that I strive so hard to calm the waves of the oceans and seas with the palm of my hand. Every day like a lifetime – oh, save me a piece, a piece of the cake. Past, just like a haze – trying all so hard to cling to fake. And still, I haven’t worked it out that there’s nothing to work out. Still, I haven’t worked it out that there’s nothing, there’s nothing"

"As the number plates drift by, my restless scanning eyes search for you."

"Fake-flower-flattery, broken glass, ancient rituals - a farce. I close my eyes and gaze at the stars. Fatal scent engraved on the brain, crumpled words spring to life in the rain, shape a face or just a stain. You come, you go and all this time, I strive, I die, I fall in love. And all that is new, is just another you."

"You’ve taught me to blend in, wearing your fake cobra skin; It fits so tight, I can’t breathe in, but you make me hang in. Oh, every time and time again, you aim to stop my fire with paraffin. And while I play the mandolin, you’re dancing with Rumpelstiltskin; Oh, I can hold my breath for longer than you think."

"Soon, the red of dawn will rise and you and I will close our eyes; Escape together from the light until we meet again tonight. I wanna see you in the night."

"Have you danced in the rain - seen all your money go down the drain? Picked yourself up with nothing to lose? Let someone else sing the blues! Ride this crazy life – day by day!"

"You walk with shoes on fire while you complain about the smoke."

"Smile at strangers on the London tube."

"Oh, the teachers told me he is real. Yeah, the preachers told me he is real. If you buy into, into their fear, oh, the devil is real in your mind."

"This time something’s wrong. This time I hear no song. This time, I feel this could be real, this could be love."

"I finally came to see that all I ever was and all I’ll ever be is always here."

"There’s no such thing as fairness; There must be other plans for us. No existence of justice; Our laws just build walls between us. There’s no such thing as freedom from the results of our deeds. No easy way in or out of this life, no escape from our needs."

"Why, people chasing their tails, day in day out; Stepping on each other’s dreams; Trying to buy something that can’t be bought - until their lights are out."

"Your flair, your style, your élègance: No matter where we are, it feels like France."

"After all to have it all, feel 10ft tall and one with all in this moment."

"Just a flash of a second of the age of the world to live this life we’ve been beckoned for our souls to unfurl. Paint on this canvas with all the colours that we know and then add some more from the magical unknown. Round and round, along the spiral, on this path supreme, spawn the sound of the cycle, called forth by our being. Oh, polish this gemstone from all sides thereof, until it shines oh so brightly in the light of love."

"Beyond the rush of anger, beyond all preconceptions, past the noise of our fears - oh, something connects us all right here!"

"Everyone has a life. That’s how it seems on the screens."

"It ain't the gold in your pockets - with everyone starving in rags. It ain't the size of your rockets - with all your foes in black bags. 'Cause carnival's in town from Sunday to Sunday. And everything's upside down, with rainbows in fun grey."

"Prescribed so many pills and each and everyone just kills. Are we now Jekyll or Hyde?"

"There’re no more dangerous rhymes in these dangerous times, 'cause danger is all we breed."

"Oceans of blue embracing the land: A drop at a time, igniting the sand."

"When I was in Moscow many people made severe criticisms about North Korea but you feel a more patriotic man when you're abroad. I thought, 'Whatever they say, I will not be concerned, I will do my best, be loyal, and serve my country with my musical ability. I began to realise I would have to sacrifice many things to live as a pianist in North Korea, and I felt disillusioned"

"“If something is between God and you, then you have a problem, an obstacle, I believe I have a huge mission to write, or to record, or to give to the world or to Christians or people who are not Christian yet."

"Do what you want to within reason but remember, take your time: nothing stops for those who can't afford to wait. The best advice that I can give you is to hold on to your head and as long as you are good and kind you'll always be a friend of mine. And it's true to say that a good friend is hard to find But I'd like to think that you are a friend of mine."

"I don't know what makes a man or a woman even think that terror isn't evil. How could anyone have plans that would guarantee the death of thousands of people? And yet as I look back now on what happened, like the calls from those in planes they were trapped in, whatever they felt that day, "I love you": that was all they wanted to say."

"It seems to me that there are more hearts broken in the world that can't be mended, left unattended. What do we do? What do we do?"

"You say you got a big house out in the country with a ruddy great swimming pool. You say you got a lot of things I never had. That's true. But are you happy? Are you happy? Are you happy? When you get right down to the nitty-gritty, are you happy? You?"

"At the very mention of your name I get shivers down my back and in my brain. The parts that used to function normally are now, as you can see, acting very strange. Oh, at the very mention of your name I don't know why but if I were tied up in chains I would somehow be released all problems too would cease my heart would never feel no pain. At the very mention of your name."

"I know that you've enjoyed all the good things money's given to you and that to have to live without them is not an easy thing to do. You take great pride in your appearance, all of which is second-to-none, and I can understand how you're feeling when you see yourself growing old, the man you love is never there to hold. But bear with me just a little bit longer. Honey, won't you bear with me, and I guarantee you that our love will grow stronger. Bear with me just a little bit longer. Honey, won't you bear with me?"

"There's nothing in the world that I'd like more than to be left standing outside your door, where perhaps I might be asked to come in. There I could very easily demonstrate of what now appears to be my fate, you see I'm hooked on something and it's not heroin. Oh, I just can't get enough of you. No, I can't get enough. What am I gonna do? I've tried every trick in the book that's going, now I've decided that they're not worth knowing, my predicament is as simple as this: I'm not satisfied, and the reason is I just can't get enough of you."

"Clair, the moment I met you I swear, I felt as if something somewhere had happened to me which I couldn't see And then, the moment I met you again, I knew in my heart that we were friends, it had to be so it couldn't be no But try as hard as I might do, I don't know why you get to me in a way I can't describe. Words mean so little when you look up and smile."

"Sometimes I think I don't know what I'm doing but I always end up doing what I know. And what I know may not, I know, be a great deal but what I know nobody can take, nobody can take, nobody can take away from me, no, no, no. Away from me, no, no, no. I do what I know. Doing what I know. Sometimes I think I don't know what I'm doing but I always end up doing what I know. Away we go, doing what I know."

"Once upon a time I drank a little wine, was as happy as could be, happy as could be, Now I'm just like a cat on a hot tin roof, Baby, what do you think you're doing to me? Told you once before and I won't tell you no more, so get down, get down, get down You're a bad dog, Baby but I still want you around, around I still want you around Hey hey hey"

"When the evening is over, put your head upon my shoulder and I'll tell you something I believe is true: happiness is me and you. In a world so distorted, where the worst is best reported love may be something that will see us through Happiness is me and you."

"I've been over and I've been under, I've been through all kinds of hell. Trouble was not only my middle name, It was my first as well. Through the years, all I've encountered, I've just one thing to say: "Hold on to what you got and don't let it slip away." I've been taken for far more rides to places I've never been, stabbed so many times in the back I no longer feel a thing. Oh, ask me what all this has taught me and I'll tell you what I'll say: "Hold on to what you got and don't let it slip away. Save it for a rainy day.""

"I guess I'll always love you... I guess I'll always care. I guess I'll always love you... I guess I'll always care." "I guess I'll always love you... I guess I'll always care. I guess I'll always love you... I guess I'll always care."

"Where to begin? The pain I am in, hard to know when to stop. Out of the blue a dream came true, only to see it drop. I'm no genius where love's concerned, more fool me to pretend. Whatever it takes, while my heart aches I'll never love again."

"I love it, but it doesn't knock me out. I think it's great, but it could be better. I like it a lot, it's just not my cup of tea, yet if you were to change the melody, take out a part that you think should be here, put in a part that wouldn't otherwise appear? Well, it's only an idea." "I hate it, but that doesn't mean it's bad. In other words, I quite enjoyed it. Apart from which, it's the best you've ever done yet if you were to change the words it would be superb... with perhaps a different melody...?"

"I have not a girl that's mine I have not a friend I have not got a place to live Indeed it seems the end But it ain't, for me as I've got myself, which matters most throughout the life I lead. I have not a penny in my pocket, and if soon I should be found just as badly broken I won't gloom cos it ain't, for me as I've got myself which matters most throughout the life I lead"

"I've never known a girl lovelier than you If I did I would be lying - that I wouldn't do Come on, have fun, mmm, make my day tonight Nothing really matters when you are in love It's the only institution I'm not weary of Don't be lonely, mmm, make my day tonight"

"You'd never think, to look at you'd never think to look at that building there, is where there used to be trees. You'd never think it, would you? You'd never think it, would you? That building there is where there used to be trees. That building there is where there... That building there is where there.. That building there is where there... used to be fields."

"Miss my love today as I miss the stars that shine above telling me one day my love will come to me again. Miss my love, I'd say, is the only thing that I can do. I just can't live with someone new reminding me of her."

"I have just one regret in life: that chance I wasted when you said goodbye. And to be honest, at the time, though I could see, I must have been blind. Oh what I'd give to have you back, relive those moments once again, I'd take your hand and we would fly, Just you and me, my love and I."

"Once I was hailed as a prodigal son. In other words, loved by everyone. Now it's so different: wherever I go, nobody wants to know. Tried having meetings. Running about. Same as I did when I started out. Now though, it's different: wherever I go, nobody wants to know."

"No matter how I try I just can't say goodbye. No matter what you say looks like I'm here to stay. No matter where I go I don't know if you know but everywhere we've been I'm kept in quarantine."

"When I'm drinking my Bonaparte shandy eating more than enough apple pies will I glance at my screen and see real human beings starve to death right in front of my eyes? Nothing old, nothing new, nothing ventured, nothing gained, nothing stillborn or lost, nothing further than proof, nothing wilder than youth, nothing older than time, nothing sweeter than wine, nothing physically recklessly hopelessly blind, nothing I couldn't say Nothing. Why? 'Cos today nothing rhymed"

"From the looks you're giving me I can tell, as well see if I've done something you think's wrong: no words need be conveyed. Then again, when we embrace, from the look that's on your face if heaven is a place on earth right here is where it's been."

"Ooh, baby, your love is so bad You, baby, you're driving me mad Ooh, baby, your kiss is so sweet You, baby, knock me off my feet Ooh, baby, I wish you were mine Ooh, baby, we'd have a good time Ooh, what can I do?"

"One minute you say you will and the next you won't, One minute you want me and the next you don't, You're turning me upside down, Giving me the runaround, Don't think that I don't know - I do, Don't think that I won't go. You watch me: It isn't out of question"

"Say it is. Say it isn't. Say it's someone else instead. Say it's good when you don't like fishing. You just knock it on the head. You just knock it on the head. Say goodbye. Say good morning. Say good evening and good noon. Say "Hello, tell me how you're feeling." "Very well thanks and how are you?""

"I never thought I'd see the day when murder would become so commonplace. Hardly a minute ever goes by without a murder taking place. And why? Well, for a start, the punishment's not hard: they sentence you to life but you're out in no time."

"Once in a while, out of the blue, I might appear somewhat rude, but don't be alarmed or get upset. Just say to yourself "This I'll forget". When I come home after being away it might do me good just to hear you say: "Darlin' don't move an inch, keep perfectly still, now do with me what you will.""

"That's the kind of love I... That's the kind of love I... That's the kind of love I need"

"When I'm alone with you it seems all my dreams come true It makes me feel so good I just can't help loving you Cos you're everything I could hope for: that's why I love you Sometimes I tell myself this girl don't love you no more and that some day with someone new she'll walk from your door But if you did, my world would break in two, that's why I love you And any time I see your face something very unusual takes place: all my inhibitions disappear now that you are here"

"You were the best fun I ever had You gave me a love that couldn't be bad You taught me things that I thought were rude Oh, ohhh, you were the best girl I ever knew (You were the best girl I ever knew) We were a couple so much in love We gave to each other over and above You made my life and I'm glad Oh, ohhh, you were the best fun I ever had You were the best fun I ever had"

"Somebody told me once money does not grow on trees. Well, if that's true, then how do you explain apples oranges and lemons, not forgetting melons?"

"It's the same the whole world over. Every year we get a little bit older. No matter what you say, no matter what you do Rich or poor, you know it's gonna happen to you."

"The way things used to be not so long ago when we were young and free. The way things used to be not so long ago you were loving me every night and every day, strong in every way passion glowing like a fire, burning with desire. Whatever happened?"

"You seem to be wanting everything yesterday. Always the impossible. That's what you seem to portray. Give me one good reason why even if I stay, you won't walk away from me tomorrow. Today."

"There is too much attention paid to him who shot at he and to how he got away but didn't quite. Yes there's too much attention So much so that we'll believe he's not guilty of the crime which he's being tried So forgive me when I tell you I ain't got no place to go I ain't got no one to talk to got no one left to say hello"

"What a way to show I love you Other than below or above you What a way to kiss each other goodbye What a way to start tomorrow Knowing that there'll be no sorrow What a way to keep each other alive"

"What's in a kiss? Have you ever wondered just what it is? More perhaps than just a moment of bliss? Tell me what's in a kiss. What's in a dream? Is it all the things you'd like to have been? All the places that you haven't yet seen? Tell me what's in a dream."

"So where did you go to, who did you see? How did you know I’d be there? Oh, and did you remember not to forget? Tell me cos I don’t... Tell me cos I don’t care Don’t care."

"When the world you live in really gets you down, when you feel a pain inside you starting to pound, and the girl you love, she doesn't want to know, let an old friend, as a godsend, lead you to where peaceful waters flow"

"Who was it that came to see you when there was no one else in sight? And who was it that stayed over an hour (and not as I'd expected, overnight)? It was me, and I'll tell you why: Oh, I did it because of my pure unabashed devotion to loving (pure unabashed devotion to loving) you, you, you, you. Who was it that caught you falling?"

"Why after all these years we've been together must you behave as if we'd hardly ever spoken, let alone met? It seems that you're happy as long as I'm upset. Oh why, oh why, oh why? Is it that you don't love me? Oh why? Have you just had enough of me? Oh why do I always have cry myself to sleep seven days a week?"

"Sat for hours in front of a screen Mouse will tell you what you are seeing When you get home, how to relax Another screen for you to look at Welcome to the world of work It's a kind of living where you give more than you'll ever receive Welcome to the world of work Only place a loyal servant can be kicked in the teeth"

"You may have given me the breaks, amended all my life's mistakes, ooh, but wait a minute, you don't own me. You may be more than just a friend on whose assistance I depend ooh, but wait a minute, you don't own me."

"Israel’s actions are fundamentally at odds with the values that Eurovision claims to uphold — peace, unity, and respect for human rights."

"You must be true to yourself. Strong enough to be true to yourself. Brave enough to be strong enough to be true to yourself. Wise enough to be brave enough, to be strong enough to shape yourself from what you actually are.”"

"So often I have said in the past, when a war is over, the statesmen should not go into conference one with another, but should turn their attention to the infant rooms, since it is from there that comes peace or war.”"

"the more violent the boy, the more I see that he creates, and when he kicks the others with his big boots, treads on fingers on the mat, hits another over the head with a piece of wood or throws a stone, I put clay in his hands, or chalk. He can create bombs if he likes or draw my house in flame, but it is the creative vent that is widening all the time and the destructive one atrophying, however much it may look to the contrary. And anyway I have always been more afraid of the weapon unspoken than of the one on the blackboard"