Pianists From England

"The Farmer will never be happy again; He carries his heart in his boots; For either the rain is destroying his grain Or the drought is destroying his roots."

"Don't let's go to the dogs tonight, For mother will be there."

"The portions of a woman which appeal to man's depravity Are constructed with considerable care."

"As my poor father used to say In 1863, Once people start on all this Art Goodbye, moralitee! And what my father used to say Is good enough for me."

"This is the most riotous satire on legal procedure that has ever been written."

"The aggressive Edwardian prosperity that lends so comfortable a background to Elgar's finales is now as strange to us as the England that produced Greensleeves and The Woodes so wilde. Stranger, in fact, and less sympathetic. In consequence much of Elgar's music, through no fault of its own, has for the present generation an almost intolerable air of smugness, self-assurance and autocratic benevolence."

"His range is so Handelian that he can give the people a universal melody or march with as sure a hand as he can give the Philharmonic Society a symphonic adagio, such as has not been given since Beethoven died."

"Elgar is not manic enough to be Russian, not witty or pointilliste enough to be French, not harmonically simple enough to be Italian and not stodgy enough to be German. We arrive at his Englishry by pure elimination."

"To my friends pictured within."

"My idea is that there is music in the air, music all around us, the world is full of it and you simply take as much as you require."

"The enigma I will not explain – its "dark saying" must be left unguessed, and I warn you that the apparent connection between the variations and the theme is often of the slightest texture."

"I always said God was against art and I still believe it. Anything obscene or trivial is blessed in this world and has a reward – I ask for no reward – only to live & to hear my work."

"People who talk of the spread of music in England and the increasing love of it, rarely seem to know where the growth of the art is really strong and properly fostered: some day the press will awake to the fact, already known abroad and to some few of us in England, that the living centre of music in Great Britain is not London, but somewhere further North."

"Play it like something you hear down by the river."

"Writing about music is like dancing about architecture — it's a really stupid thing to want to do."

"Now I just don't know who to tell to go to hell Who put the old devil in the distorted angel?"

"As I walk through This wicked world Searchin' for light in the darkness of insanity, I ask myself Is all hope lost? Is there only pain and hatred, and misery? And each time I feel like this inside, There's one thing I wanna know: What's so funny 'bout Peace, Love, & Understanding?"

"Nonsense prevails, modesty fails Grace and virtue turn into stupidity While the calendar fades almost all barricades to a pale compromise And our leaders have feasts on the backsides of beasts They still think they're the gods of antiquity If something you missed didn't even exist It was just an ideal — is it such a surprise?"

"What shall we do, what shall we do with all this useless beauty?"

"Well there's a line that you must toe and it'll soon be time to go but it's darker than you know in those Complicated Shadows"

"There's always something that's smoldering somewhere I know it don't make a difference to you But oh! It sure made a difference to me You'll see me off in the distance, I hope At the other end At the other end of the telescope."

"Now Im dead, now Im dead, and you're all Going on to meet your reward. Are you scared? Are you scared? Are you scared? Are you scared? You might have never heard, but God's comic."

"Lie down baby now don't say a word There there baby your vision is blurred Your head is so sore from all of that thinking I don't want to hurt you now But I think you're shrinking."

"Why can't a man stand alone? Must he be burdened by all that he's taught to consider his own? His skin and his station, his kin and his crown, his flag and his nation They just weigh him down"

"I'm a man with a mission in two or three editions And I'm giving you a longing look Everyday, everyday, everyday I write the book."

"Don't tell me you don't know what love is When you're old enough to know better."

"The boy said 'Dad they're going to take me to task But I'll be back by Christmas' It's just a rumour that was spread around town Somebody said that someone got filled in For saying that people get killed in The result of this shipbuilding With all the will in the world Diving for dear life When we could be diving for pearls."

"So beautiful and fortunate You're the one who hates to love But he's the one who loves to hate."

"Oliver's army is here to stay Oliver's army are on their way And I would rather be anywhere else But here today."

"Clowntime is over Time to take over While others just talk and talk Somebody's watching where the others don't walk."

"Is it all in that pretty little head of yours? What goes on in that place in the dark? Well I used to know a girl and I would have sworn that her name was Veronica Well she used to have a carefree mind of her own and a delicate look in her eye These days I'm afraid she's not even sure if her name is Veronica."

"I wanna bite the hand that feeds me. I wanna bite that hand so badly. I want to make them wish they'd never seen me."

"Turn up the TV. No one listening will suspect, even your mother won't detect it, no your father won't know. they think that I've got no respect but everything means less than zero."

"Accidents will happen We only hit and run He used to be your victim Now you're not the only one.Accidents will happen We only hit and run I don't want to hear it 'Cause I know what I've done."

"I don't feel any form of music is beyond me in the sense of that I don't understand it or I don't have some love for some part of it. And if there's something in it that I can respond to, then there's something that I might be able to use as a composer. There are records of mine that have had smaller audiences and have provoked really drastic responses from people — particularly from critics — who maybe don't have quite enough time to live with the record or accept that a piece has its own integrity."

"We stayed out of Memphis early on in the late 70s for obvious reasons. People were very sensitive about Elvis Presley, and my stage name obviously would be provocative to some people in that area at that time. So we didn't visit Memphis until about 1984."

"The first song that most people picked up on, particularly in America, of mine, was a ballad, not a rock'n'roll song. It was 'Alison', and that's an R&B ballad. I don't think there's any other way to describe it."

"Nice girls, not one with a defect, Cellophane shrink-wrapped, so correct. Red dogs under illegal legs, She looks so good that he gets down and begs.She is watching the detectives. "Ooh, it's so cute." She's watching the detectives. When they shoot, shoot, shoot, shoot. They beat him up until the teardrops start, But he can't be wounded 'cause he's got no heart."

"Theres so many fish in the sea That only rise up in the sweat and smoke like mercury"

"While you lie in the dark, afraid to breathe and you beg and you promise And you bargain and you plead Sometimes you confuse me with Santa Claus It's the big white beard I suppose. Im going up to the pole, where you folks die of cold I might be gone for a while if you need me."

"My sense of history in music is much greater than a lot of people's. I listen a lot further back in the whole history of music. It's not just pop music of the last 20, 30, 40, 50 years. I'm listening to stuff from hundreds of years ago as well, because you can learn from everything."

"Then I became an altar boy because of the solemn face, but I got thrown out at fourteen for laughing, because the priest used to mumble everything except the church plate takings."

"These are the sort of things that push you on in music — the curiosity, a passion for new ideas. It's important to keep restoring that, and at the same time, hold on to the core things about music that whenever you pick the simplest form of instrument; guitar or piano, you can find a song that's worthwhile."

"I've had a lot of different experiences in music over the years. And not everything you do can satisfy everybody's idealised version of you."

"Alison, I know this world is killing you. Oh, Alison, my aim is true. My aim is true."

"Oh I used to be disgusted and now I try to be amused. But since their wings have got rusted, you know, the angels wanna wear my red shoes."

"She said that's that. I don't wanna chitter-chat. Turn it down a little bit or turn it down flat. Pump it up when you don't really need it. Pump it up until you can feel it."

"They say you better listen to the voice of reason But they don't give you any choice 'cause they think that it's treason. So you had better do as you are told. You better listen to the radio."

"And it's the damage that we do And never know It's the words that we don't say That scare me so."

"I can't actually play any instrument properly. I can't read music. And here's the New York Times calling me the new George Gershwin. It was so ridiculous, really embarrassing. It was embarrassing to watch these people fall into the trap of their own critical conceits."