"Gabriel Fauré had two maxims he was fond of and used to repeat "six times an hour": "Nuance is the thing," he would say, "not a change of movement." Or again: "The bass line is with us," and it is to Fauré that I have to thank my love of the bass line in music [sic]. How right he was. I have spent my life demonstrating the truth of this. The entire construction is built on the bass line and without it music collapses. Any musician worthy of the name has this respect for the bass line. It is the root of harmony, the fundamental support of the chord. It must always be laid down, without heaviness, of course, but with sufficient strength to balance the phrase it supports. It is the rallying point which assures stability of the formation of successive modulations. At one of the big concerts given at the Institut, Charles-Marie Widor, who was then Permanent Secretary, asked me to play some of Fauré's music. While I was playing, Widor had his eyes closed and I even thought that he was asleep. As the last note died away, he sat up and said: "Oh, what a lovely bass line." Some months later the great organist underwent an operation for cataracts. I wrote to him offering my wishes for a speedy recovery and as a postscript to his answer he added: "And that lovely bass line — I think of it yet.""