"...punk rock had to come along because the rock scene had become so tame that [acts] like Billy Joel and Simon and Garfunkel were being called rock and roll, when to me and other fans, rock and roll meant this wild and rebellious music."

"Punk rock is meant to be our freedom. We're meant to be able to do what we want to do."

"...punk's nihilistic swagger was the most thrilling thing in England."

"....attaining authenticity in the punk identity can be difficult."

"On TV, if you watched cop shows, Kojak, Baretta, when the cops finally catch the mass murderer, they'd say, 'you dirty Punk.' It was what your teachers would call you. It meant that you were the lowest."

"Girls invented punk rock, not England."

"...rock and roll by people who didn't have very many skills as musicians but still felt the need to express themselves through music."

"In its initial form, a lot of [1960s] stuff was innovative and exciting. Unfortunately, what happens is that people who could not hold a candle to the likes of Hendrix started noodling away. Soon you had endless solos that went nowhere. By 1973, I knew that what was needed was some pure, stripped down, no bullshit rock 'n' roll."

"What made punk rock so exciting in its early years was that everything felt like an accident. Those albums became artifacts, the kind that saw a bunch of (usually) teenagers articulating things based on impulse instead of know-how."

"It would be possible to write the whole history of punk music without mentioning any male bands at all – and I think a lot of [people] would find that very surprising."

"Punk was a total cultural revolt. It was a hardcore confrontation with the black side of history and culture, right-wing imagery, sexual taboos, a delving into it that had never been done before by any generation in such a thorough way."

"According to one theory, punk rock all goes back to Ritchie Valens's "La Bamba." Just consider Valens's three-chord mariachi squawkup in the light of "Louie Louie" by the Kingsmen, then consider "Louie Louie" in the light of "You Really Got Me" by the Kinks, then "You Really Got Me" in the light of "No Fun" by the Stooges, then "No Fun" in the light of "Blitzkrieg Bop" by the Ramones, and finally note that "Blikskrieg Bop" sounds a lot like "La Bamba.""

"Although the origins of punk rock, as we know it today, undoubtedly include artists like Patti Smith, The Velvet Underground, and The Stooges, the origins of punk as an attitude can be traced back much further. In essence, punk is about the rejection of societal and musical norms, pursuing something entirely original and often revolutionary. In that sense, punk could be traced back to the original wave of jazz stars, who sought to tear down the boundaries of traditional music to create something modern and rebellious."

"Rap music is the only vital form of music introduced since punk rock."

"The Sex Pistols were still rock'n'roll ... like the craziest version of Chuck Berry. Hardcore was a radical departure from that. It wasn't verse-chorus rock. It dispelled any notion of what songwriting is supposed to be. It's its own form."

"Hippies were rainbow extremists; punks are romantics of black-and-white. Hippies forced warmth; punks cultivate cool. Hippies kidded themselves about free love; punks pretend that s&m is our condition. As symbols of protest, swastikas are no less fatuous than flowers."

"But I was a rebel in the usual, rather superficial, ways that teenagers in the late 1970s were. I mean, I went fairly quickly from punk rock to Thatcherism. The two had much in common. The urge to challenge the consensus was very powerful in me at the age of 15, 16, 17, and the Sex Pistols and Margaret Thatcher alike were rebarbative and critical of what seemed to me a rather stagnant country."

"I had always sung in choirs. Even when it was something to be laughed at or made fun of, you know, in school. And I was always the kid who was picked at the Christmas concert to sing the solo, you know, while the other kids snickered in the front few rows."

"Once the Mass is restored to its rightful place, we will again see choirs being developed. New compositions will be written because the composers, like their forebears, will see the setting of the Mass text to music as a means of possibly expiating their sins and assuring their music's immortality. Musicians will fight for the chance to become organists and choirmasters. The faithful will clamor for it. It will again become part of a living tradition."

"It’s singing and rugby. And I don’t do the rugby. I always sang in school choirs and went on tours to other countries. I have always loved it. It’s a very communal thing, and you really connect with people."

"I guess I originally got the bug for performing when I was in choirs and school stuff and all that. I don't know when. I guess I decided to do it because a lot of people said I was good, and I liked the attention."

"I have one idea about this whole interpretation problem as it relates to orchestral music — too many of our conductors start with old music. What they should do is interpret the music of our time and then go backwards. They would be much better off because if you interpret a contemporary work, where the composer is still alive and have contact with the compositional mind, you will also play older music as looked at from the perspective of the composer, instead of an interpretive kind of idea. I hate the performer that says, “Did you ever hear my Beethoven?” I don’t want to hear his Beethoven! I want to hear Beethoven."

"Numerous important conductors and composers were (and are) players of instruments other than the piano or organ over the course of their careers (Hans Richter, Edric Cundell, Daniel Jones, Edward Downes, Cedric Thorpe Davie and Norman Del Mar were hornists, Malcolm Arnold and Elgar Howarth trumpeters, Gustav Holst and George Alexander Macfarren trombonists, Simon Rattle a percussionist, Christian Darnton a bassoonist, Arthur Nikisch, Basil Cameron, Eugène Goossens and George Lloyd violinists, John Barbirolli, Charles Lucas, Havergal Brian and Arturo Toscanini cellists, and Benjamin Britten and Frank Bridge were violists). The intimate knowledge of the orchestra one gleans as a player is very valuable for conducting a symphony orchestra or writing orchestral compositions."

"Sound is a minimal condition of the musical fact."

"Any element belonging to the total musical fact can be isolated, or taken as a strategic variable of musical production."

"Writing of her own Igbo music, the Nigerian musicologist Chinyere Nwachukwu maintains that the 'concept of music nkwa combines singing, playing musical instruments, and dancing into one act'. Whatever concept of 'music' is held by members of western society, it is highly improbable that, apart from forward-looking scholars and composers, it will contain all three elements. Nkwa in fact is not 'music' but a wider affective channel that is closer to the karimojong mode of expression than to western practice. The point of interest here is that Nwachukwu feels constrained to use the erroneous term 'music': not because she is producing a 'musical dissertation,' but because the 'one act' the Igbos perform has no equivalent in the English language. By forcing the Igbo concept into the Procrustean bed of western conceptualization, she is in effect surrendering to the dominance of western ideas—or at least to the dominance of the English language! How different things would have been if the Igbo tongue had attained the same 'universality' as English!."

"Just as parameters within a culture are distinguished from one another because they are governed by somewhat different constraints, so it is with the parameters of music: melody, harmony, timbre, etc., are more or less independent variables."

"Melody, harmony, rhythm, dynamics, tessitura, timbre, tempo, meter, texture, and perhaps others"

"Two aspects of each of these parameters should be taken into consideration: the quality of each parameter at any given moment and the way in which each parameter changes as the music progresses"

"There is very little dispute about the principal constituent elements of music, though experts will differ on the precise definitions of each aspect. Most central are 'pitch' (or melody) and 'rhythm'...next in importance only to pitch and rhythm is 'timbre', the characteristic qualities of tone."

"Musical research since the late twentieth century has given greater consideration to certain social and embodied aspects of music."

"Melody, rhythm, timbre, harmony, and the like."

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

"We consider classical music to be the epitome and quintessence of our culture, because it is that culture’s clearest, most significant gesture and expression. In this music we possess the heritage of classical antiquity and Christianity, a spirit of serenely cheerful and brave piety, a superbly chivalric morality. For in the final analysis every important cultural gesture comes down to a morality, a model for human behavior concentrated into a gesture."

"We were working on a long and complex song called ‘The End,’ which is hard-driving jazz played simultaneously with a baroque string quartet. I wanted the hard hitting music to also have a layer of quiet restraint from the classical music. To me it made complete sense. I thought it was beautiful."

"ARE my eyes deceiving me, or is this a string quartet topping the US classical charts? Hmm, depends on whom you believe. The instruments - two violins, cello, viola - may be the same as Haydn's, but the players are four near-naked girls, gyrating to an amplified backing track. Bond, as the band are called, have been barred from the UK charts as inadequately classical. On the other hand, they have been booked to curtain-raise the Classical Brits awards. Make of that muddle what you will, in an industry that has lost the confidence to tell high art from low, good art from bad, real art from clone. The Bond girls are not bad players. They are simply living in a bad time for practising the intimate, introspective art of the string quartet."

"From tentative beginnings, the string quartet has evolved for over 240 years, serving as a medium for some of the most profound and personal musical expression. At first it was a medium that allowed four gentlemen amateurs to converse musically, an aspect of its function that has retained its significance throughout the years. But this aspect has long been interconnected with a view of the genre as one that is appropriate for music of the deepest personal expression, as well as sophisticated humour and wit."

"The shadows in the courtyard grew longer, and finally the hot day gave way to slate- gray dusk and a moonlit night. The talk was still going on when, quite suddenly, a young violinist appeared on a balcony above the courtyard. There was a hush as, high above us, he struck up the first great D minor chords of Bach's Chaconne. All at once, and with utter certainty, I had found my link with the center. The moonlit Altmuhl Valley below would have been reason enough for a romantic transfiguration; but that was not it. The clear phrases of the Chaconne touched me like a cool wind, breaking through the mist and revealing the towering structures beyond. There had always been a path to the central order in the language of music, in philosophy and in religion, today no less than in Plato's day and in Bach's. That I now knew from my own experIence. We spent the rest of the night around campfires and in our tents on a meadow above the castle, giving full rein to our romantic and poetic sentiments. The young musician, himself a student, sat near our group and played minuets by Mozart and Beethoven interspersed with old folk songs; I tried to accompany him on my guitar. Otherwise, he proved a very gay young fellow and was reluctant to discuss his solemn rendering of the Chaconne. When pressed, he came back at us with "Do you know the key of the trumpets of Jericho?" "No." "D minor [d-moll] also, of course." "Why?" "Because they d-moll-ished the walls!" He escaped our wrath only by taking to his heels."

"Nervousness in playing from memory in public is largely a result of the mental defect of lack of concentration, when it is not directly caused by a run-down physical condition."

"The possession of a reliable musical memory is valuable to all musicians, is important to some and is an absolute necessity to others. The composer who can retain his own musical ideas, wherever and whenever they may occur to him, without the use of his cuff or a scrap of paper, may well rejoice in his independence of material aids. The critic who is able when placed face to face with the first performance of a novelty to hold in his mind's ear the subject matter of importance as the work develops will be in a position to write an intelligent account of what he has heard."

"Piano music may be memorized in three ways: by ear, by visual memory, either of the notes on the printed page or the notes on the keyboard, and by finger memory or reflex action."

"While music has long been recognized as an effective form of therapy to provide an outlet for emotions, the notion of using song, sound frequencies and rhythm to treat physical ailments is a relatively new domain, says psychologist Daniel J. Levitin, PhD, who studies the neuroscience of music at McGill University in Montreal. A wealth of new studies is touting the benefits of music on mental and physical health. For example, in a meta-analysis of 400 studies, Levitin and his postgraduate research fellow, Mona Lisa Chanda, PhD, found that music improves the body's immune system function and reduces stress. Listening to music was also found to be more effective than prescription drugs in reducing anxiety before surgery (Trends in Cognitive Sciences, April, 2013)."

"Someday you will be a man, And you will be the leader of a big old band. Many people coming from miles around To hear you play your music when the sun go down Maybe someday your name will be in lights Saying Johnny B. Goode tonight."

""We've found compelling evidence that musical interventions can play a health-care role in settings ranging from operating rooms to family clinics," says Levitin, author of the book "This is Your Brain on Music" (Plume/Penguin, 2007). The analysis also points to just how music influences health. The researchers found that listening to and playing music increase the body's production of the antibody immunoglobulin A and natural killer cells — the cells that attack invading viruses and boost the immune system's effectiveness. Music also reduces levels of the stress hormone cortisol."

"The ascetic Gotama … avoids watching dancing, singing, music and shows. He abstains from using garlands, perfumes, cosmetics, ornaments and adornments. … He refrains from running errands, from buying and selling."

"Without music, life would be a mistake."

"One recent study on the link between music and stress found that music can help soothe pediatric emergency room patients (JAMA Pediatrics, July, 2013). In the trial with 42 children ages 3 to 11, University of Alberta researchers found that patients who listened to relaxing music while getting an IV inserted reported significantly less pain, and some demonstrated significantly less distress, compared with patients who did not listen to music. In addition, in the music-listening group, more than two-thirds of the health-care providers reported that the IVs were very easy to administer — compared with 38 percent of providers treating the group that did not listen to music."

"Music is well said to be the speech of angels."

"Among one’s human incarnations there is invariably found an incarnation devoted to rhythmic labor. Whether this be some sort of craftsmanship or music, singing or farm work, every man infallibly will cultivate in himself the rhythm which fills all of life. Upon learning of certain incarnations, people frequently are astonished as to why they should have been so insignificant. But in them there was being worked out the rhythm of labor. One of the greatest of qualities, this must be acquired through conflict and patience. 49."