women-pianists

"I do not believe that the few women who have achieved greatness in creative work are the exception, but I think that life has been hard on women. It has not given them opportunity, it has not made them convincing. A woman has not been considered a working force in the world, and the work that her sex and conditions impose upon her has not been so adjusted as to give her a little fuller scope for the development of her best self. She has been handicapped and only the few through force of circumstances or inherent strength have been able to get the better of that handicap. There is no sex and art. Genius is an independent quality. The woman of the future with her broader outlook, her greater opportunities will go far, I believe, in creative work of every description."

"It is not a young girl who composes, this is a composer"

"Her music has a certain feminine daintiness and grace, but it is amazingly superficial and wanting in variety. But on the whole, this concert confirmed that the conviction held by many, that while women may someday vote, they will never learn to compose anything worthwhile."

"Marriage must adapt itself to one's career. With a man, it is all arranged and expected. If the woman is the artist, it upsets the standards, the conventions, the usual arrangements, and usually, it ruins the woman's art. I feel that it is difficult to reconcile the domestic life with the artistic. A woman should choose one or the other. She must have freedom, not restraint. She must receive aid, not selfish, jealous exactions and complaints. When a woman of talent marries a man who appreciates that side of her, such a marriage may be ideally happy for both."

"It was an unforgettable performance. Argerich celebrated her 75th birthday in June this year, but that news doesn't seem to have reached her fingers. Her playing is still as dazzling, as frighteningly precise, as it has always been; her ability to spin gossamer threads of melody as matchless as ever. This was unmistakably and unashamedly Liszt in the grand manner, a bit old-fashioned and sometimes even a bit vulgar at times, but in this of all concertos, with Barenboim and the orchestra following each twist and turn, every little quickening and moment of expressive reflection, it seemed entirely appropriate"

"Nothing conduces so emphatically to the harmony of sounds as perfect classical piano play."

"I don't play this work as a tour de force, as a dazzling display of technique--I play it as a life experience."

"Would-be musicians are starving themselves emotionally and intellectually just to be perfect."

"I’m nothing but a conduit. The music goes though my ears, my fingers... Composer is a god. Composer creates music. We’re performers. We’re just passing it on."

"... ongoing accusations of deeply offensive language by Ukrainian media outlets"

"Valentina Lisitsa in conversation with Melanie Spanswick (Nov 4, 2012) on Youtube 80,802 views"

"Memorising notes as one memorises a speech in foreign language is bound to lead to memory lapses. YouTube is an invaluable tool; you can get to study your repertory with the best pianists of all times. Use it. If you are learning a piece, don’t hesitate to put your headphones on and just play along with your favourite recording. No matter how many times you hear the playing you will not grasp all the finer points if not directly measuring your inner hearing of music with the an interpretation you like."

"It’s only when you stop trying to find faults and start doing something constructive that you will survive … It’s just good for you as a human not to dwell on your disasters."

"If the question [about if there were only one composer in the world I could play] is purely ‘original’ works, no transcriptions, then Beethoven."

"It had to go all the way out to the west coast and come all the way back to the east coast every time it needed to be fixed."

"Now my ears are awakening again, just because I’m part of the zeitgeist of contemporary whatever. Even though I’m in this remote place, I get it."

"When it broke down, I would break down. I had to wean myself from it just to survive. I had to have interventions. People would say, ‘You’ve got to do something else.’ So that was part of it—being too dependent on this thing I couldn’t count on."

"And if it made it one trip, it wouldn’t make the other. Then somebody stole half of it. I found out about that 20 years later, when someone sent me a photograph and said, ‘Does this look familiar to you?’ I nearly fainted."

"The frustration was with the philosophy of the instrument."

"Mais il mourut à la nuit même Sans un adieu, sans un je t'aime Mon père, mon père le ciel de Nantes Rend mon coeur chagrin."

"Et tant pis pour ceux qui s'etonnent Et que les autres me pardonnent Mais les enfants ce sont les memes A Paris ou a Gottingen."

"Standing outside the house where she was born, in June 1930, I think some things in Paris never change...things like the smell of fresh-baked baguettes at daybreak, the Napoleonic arcades [-] the morning coffee that you drink standing up for double impact and the sound of a chanson that's not just popular, its intensely personal, to everyone who hears it, it's a song that evokes a place, an encounter, a moment in your life. It might be sung by Edith Piaf, or Jacques Brel, or Juliette Greco - but the one for me who delves deepest into the collective unconscious, is almost unknown outside France, and her song is the story of millions of private lives, of the spirit of Paris, of the narrative of our times, of my lifetime, she's known as Barbara, though that's not her real name, she called herself, the Black Eagle, and she always wore black."

"Un beau jour, ou peut-etre une nuit, Près d'un lac, je m'étais endormie, Quand soudain, semblant crever le ciel, Et venant de nulle part, Surgit un aigle noir."

"Music is therapy for me. It's my outlet for every negative thing I've ever been through. It lets me turn something bad into something beautiful."

"I saw Amadeus when I was nine years old and fell in love with Mozart. The part of Mozart's Requiem called "Lacrymosa" is my favorite piece of music ever. I always wished we could cover it, but with programming and guitars and make it cool. It's our moment to try all the things I wanted to and couldn't, so I started messing with it in Protools. Terry wrote some riffs and turned it into this awesome metal epic."

"I never practice, I always play."

"You play Bach your way and I'll play him his way."

"Feist's third album of new material, "The Reminder" is ... the album that should transform her from the darling of the indie-rock circuit to a full-fledged star, and do it without compromises. "The Reminder" is a modestly scaled but quietly profound pop gem: sometimes intimate, sometimes exuberant, filled with love songs and hints of mystery. ... In her new love songs Feist apologizes, confesses to longing, hints at betrayals and misunderstandings and wonders what might have been. Her voice is self-possessed yet unguarded, and it hovers in arrangements that are often modest — just a handful of musicians playing together in a room — but can also proffer gleaming instrumental hooks and nonsense syllables that invite singalongs. The songs find equipoise within heartache."

"Apple has really done its job. I thought it was a cute but harmless song (I first heard the song when she performed it on Letterman this past summer, and thought the chorus part was fun. That was about it). But now? I'm at the point where I'm thinking, "the next time I'm on iTunes I should download that song." And there's a reason for that. If I don't hear the entire song, the thirty-second snippet Apple gave us in the ad will rattle around in my cranium for months. So it's either download the song or go out and yell at the college kid who's going to serve me my latte tomorrow morning. You can see that I have no choice."

"She really poured it on. She always pours it on. That's Feist."

"I'm a stem now Pushing the drought aside Opening up Fanning my yellow eye On the ferry That's making the waves wave Illumination This is how my heart behaves."

"Feist comes from an indie-rock world, where it's sacrilege to admit any kind of ambition. But I had 100 percent in my mind the idea that we should have as much material as possible that could be played on the radio or resonate with a huge bunch of people. We already have the built-in reflex not to get behind anything that's going to be hollow. And when you have an artist with this kind of credibility, the idea is to communicate to as many people as possible without doing something ridiculous."

"Sweet heart, bitter heart Now I can't tell you apart Cozy and cold Put the horse before the cartThose teenage hopes Who have tears in their eyes Too scared to own up To one little lie."

"Oh, oh, oh You're changing your heart Oh, oh, oh You know who you are."

"One, two, three, four, five, six, nine, and ten Money can't buy you back the love that you had then."

"The truth lied And lies divide Lies divide"

"The tragedy starts from the very first spark Losing your mind for the sake of your heart The saddest part of a broken heart Isn't the ending so much as the start."

"I know more than I knew before I didn't rest I didn't stop Did we fight or did we talk."

"One Two Three Four Tell me that you love me more Sleepless, long nights That was what my youth was for Old teenage hopes are alive at your door Left you with nothing But they want some more."

"The cold heart will burst If mistrusted first And a calm heart will break When given a shake"

"It may be years until the day My dreams will match up with my pay."

"By nature of me being the one singing it and writing it there is always an innate bit of autobiography there ... but I think I learned years ago that you don't get songs that have that long stride and that pivot-hinge ability if it's too much diary entry."

"Because there's just so much in a day now, I keep writing in much more abstract terms, like I don't try to write about what happened anymore. It would be impossible."

"Bring all the spaces together And all the silences ever Bring all the spaces together Come close again Be my pause before the end I miss you, oh, like a fading dream And I have a feeling you know what I mean"

"I know I'm sane I don't give a care for the crown or the shield I will not protect you or happily yield To the one who makes me come undone"

"Helping the kids out of their coats But wait the babies haven't been born I'm unpacking the bags and setting up And planting lilacs and buttercups But in the meantime I've got it hard Second floor living without a yard."

"Old dirt road (Mushaboom) Knee deep snow (Mushaboom) Watching the fire as we grow (Mushaboom)"

"Ooh, I'll be the one who'll break my heart I'll be the one to hold the gun."

"No one likes to take a test Sometimes you know more is less."

"I got a man to stick it out And make a home from a rented house And we'll collect the moments one by one I guess that's how the future's done."