Pianist Quotes - Page 2

• One of the reasons I believe in jazz is that the oneness of man can come through the rhythm of your heart. It’s the same anyplace in the world, that heartbeat. It’s the first thing you hear when you’re born — or before you’re born — and it’s the last thing you hear.

  Dave Brubeck

  Music, Believe, Heart

  "Biography/ Personal Quotes". www.imdb.com.

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• Many in Hollywood viewed the public persona of the young Debbie Reynolds as demure and vulnerable to be a complete facade. Pianist Oscar Levant once quipped, "She's as wistful as an iron factory."

  Elizabeth Taylor

  Character, Iron, Personality

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• I met the pianist Barry Harris when I was about fifteen. He would show me changes, which I had no idea existed. I knew about scales, but I didn't think about chords. I was fortunate in that he lived right around the corner so I'd be at his house almost every day and he showed me about playing melodies over chords. After about three years, I could play some gigs. I worked with drummer Roy Brooks and other guys my age at that time, like trumpeter Lonnie Hillyer. Some of the older guys were Paul Chambers, Doug Watkins and Louis Hayes

  Charles McPherson

  Thinking, Years, Play

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• Ask any great athlete or the concert pianist or the successful actor if they have arrived at the place where they need no further practice. They will tell you that the higher you climb in proficiency and public acceptance, the greater the need for practice.

  Eric Butterworth

  Athlete, Acceptance, Successful

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• Laughter is the closest distance between two people.

  Victor Borge

  Inspirational, Cute, Relationship

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• When you get to the top, don't forget to send the elevator down for the next guy.

  Stan Kenton

  Music, Guy, Next

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• Love life and life will love you back. Love people and they will love you back.

  Arthur Rubinstein

  Love, Life, Positive Thinking

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• Jazz is my adventure.

  Thelonious Monk

  Adventure, Jazz

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• Composing is like driving down a foggy road.

  Benjamin Britten

  Bricks And Mortar, Fog, Driving

  "The Classical Music Experience: Discover the Music of the World's Greatest Composers". Book by Julius H. Jacobson (p.341), 2008.

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• I started taking piano lessons when I was about four years old. My parents were both musicians. So I took piano lessons. I didn't like the lessons very much, but I was enchanted by music. Music always transported me somewhere. Singing made feel good and being able to play the piano made me feel good.

  Billy Joel

  Years, Play, Piano

  FaceBook post by Billy Joel from Oct 22, 2013

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• Perfection itself is imperfection.

  Vladimir Horowitz

  Perfection, Imperfection, Not Being Perfect

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• Nina Simone was a gifted and prolific singer, songwriter and pianist who became a powerful presence in the civil rights movement and paid a professional price for it. Behind the scenes, she struggled in a fractious, sometimes violent relationship with her husband and manager and with mental health issues that strained other relationships, including with her only daughter.

  Michel Martin

  Daughter, Powerful, Husband

  "Nina Simone's Daughter Says This Film Gets Her Mom's Story Straight". "All Things Considered" with Michel Martin, www.npr.org. February 14, 2016.

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• I think all record companies should be run by a musician. Just as you wouldn't trust your health to an electrician.

  Paul Bley

  Music, Running, Thinking

  "Paul Bley obituary" by Richard Williams, www.theguardian.com. January 6, 2016.

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• When you are studying jazz, the best thing to do is listen to records or listen to live music. It isn't as though you go to a teacher. You just listen as much as you can and absorb everything.

  Carla Bley

  Music, Teacher, Listening

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• The less you want, the richer you are. The more you need in order to be happy, the more miserable you’ll be.

  Yanni

  Inspirational, Happiness, Happy

  Yanni, David Rensin (2003). “Yanni in Words”, Miramax Books

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• I am God! I am nothing, I'm play, I am freedom, I am life. I am the boundary, I am the peak.

  Alexander Scriabin

  Life, God, Freedom

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• Competitions are for horses, not artists.

  Bela Bartok

  Inspirational, Funny, Inspiring

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• I don't believe in geniuses, I believe in hard work.

  Michel Petrucciani

  Motivational, Music, Work

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• Pianists of extraordinary talent, such as Christina Petrowska,spend a large part of their early lives perfecting technique…Miss Petrowska,a Canadian with a phenomenal ability to play the most difficult music cleanly, gave a demonstration of her achievements at Carnegie Recital Hall. A product of the Juilliard School who studied with Karlheinz Stockhausen and Gyorgy Ligeti in Europe, Miss Petrowska built most of her program around fiercely difficult contemporary works. She has fingers that work like chrome-plated pistons, and her high-seated position let her bring pulverizing power to bear.

  Donal Henahan

  School, Play, Europe

  "Dazzling, No More" by Donal Henahan, www.nytimes.com. May 18, 1977.

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• I wanted to be a jazz pianist, but I wasn't good enough. I got into city college because I didn't have the grades to get into university. I took acting because it was a way to get three credits. I just needed three credits and my friend told me to take acting because it was like gym - nobody fails you. I took it and that's literally how I got involved in acting.

  Dustin Hoffman

  Life, College, Destiny

  "Dustin Hoffman at Play in Mr. Magorium's Wonder Emporium". Press Conference, movieweb.com. November 19, 2007.

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• Being a pianist allows me to play in any language.

  Dino Kartsonakis

  Play, Language

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• Years ago, while being in an airport in Australia, I happened to meet with David Helfgott. I knew that he was a bit fond of me and I was personally a fan of him. We were so happy to meet and hug and we had a very warm conversation together. Since that time.... about 20 years ago, I have not meet him again. I think that he is a very good pianist !

  Richard Clayderman

  Thinking, Airports, Years

  Source: performancereviewed.com

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• When I create I don't think in technical or mathematical terms until the idea is formulated Musical composition is formulated in improvisation. Once a pianist like myself sits down and begins to play and start thinking about what I am writing all of a sudden a little tune will emerge, a little spot light and I'll go, "That's interesting."

  Aaron Zigman

  Writing, Thinking, Light

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• I urge pupils when studying a work and in order to master its most important aspic, the rhythmic structure, or the ordering of the time process, to do just what a conductor does with the score: to place music on the desk and to conduct the work from beginning to end as if it were played by someone else, an imaginary pianist with the conductor trying to impress him with his will, his tempo first of all, plus all the details of his performance.

  Heinrich Neuhaus

  Order, Important, Trying

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• When a pianist sits down and does a virtuoso performance he is in a technical sense transmitting more information to a machine than any other human activity involving machinery allows.

  Robert Moog

  Doe, Machines, Down And

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