Famous quotes containing the words classical music, classical, music and/or service:
“The basic difference between classical music and jazz is that in the former the music is always greater than its performance—Beethoven’s Violin Concerto, for instance, is always greater than its performance—whereas the way jazz is performed is always more important than what is being performed.”
—André Previn (b. 1929)
“Against classical philosophy: thinking about eternity or the immensity of the universe does not lessen my unhappiness.”
—Mason Cooley (b. 1927)
“If music in general is an imitation of history, opera in particular is an imitation of human willfulness; it is rooted in the fact that we not only have feelings but insist upon having them at whatever cost to ourselves.... The quality common to all the great operatic roles, e.g., Don Giovanni, Norma, Lucia, Tristan, Isolde, Brünnhilde, is that each of them is a passionate and willful state of being. In real life they would all be bores, even Don Giovanni.”
—W.H. (Wystan Hugh)
“Old books that have ceased to be of service should no more be abandoned than should old friends who have ceased to give pleasure.”
—Peregrine, Sir Worsthorne (b. 1923)