Symphony Orchestras Quotes

• No one can whistle a symphony. It takes a whole orchestra to play it.

  Halford Luccock

  Life, Teamwork, Science

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• I used to think that running an organization was equivalent to conducting a symphony orchestra. But I don't think that's quite it; it's more like jazz. There is more improvisation.

  Warren G. Bennis

  Leadership, Running, Thinking

  Warren G. Bennis (1997). “Managing People is Like Herding Cats”, Executive Excellence Pub

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• I'm too busy playing. When I'm playing I don't pay attention to who's listening. When I was listening I listened to symphony orchestras, Beethoven, Bach, Brahms, Stravinsky. You don't listen to one instrument; you listen to music.

  Charles Mingus

  Symphony, Listening, Attention

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• A man who wants to lead the orchestra must turn his back on the crowd.

  Max Lucado

  Motivational, Strength, Leadership

  Max Lucado (2010). “Chronicles of the Cross Collection”, p.205, Harper Collins

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• The director is a bit analogous to the conductor of a symphony orchestra. It's a collaborative adventure.

  Nicholas Meyer

  Travel, Adventure, Symphony

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• Composers love to write for symphony orchestras because the symphony is the Rolls Royce of musical instruments.

  David Del Tredici

  Writing, Symphony, Musical

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• And over the last ten years, after my work with the Brodsky Quartet, I had the opportunity to write arrangements for chamber group, chamber orchestra, jazz orchestra, symphony orchestra even.

  Elvis Costello

  Writing, Opportunity, Years

  Interview with Brian Wise, www.elviscostello.info. April 10, 2004.

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• No symphony orchestra ever played music like a two-year-old girl laughing with a puppy.

  Bernard Williams

  Family, Girl, Dog

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• If a professional musician in a symphony orchestra is playing Beethoven. But this particular orchestra have played this particular chestnut so many times, they can play it in their sleep. Does the genius remain present in the music or not?

  Robert Fripp

  Sleep, Play, Symphony

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• When you hear a large symphony orchestra. for instance, in a concert hall, there's a big, sweeping sound that just doesn't get on to a record.

  Teddy Wilson

  Symphony, Orchestra, Sound

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• And at the same time, I had my very first concert at the age of 16. I hadn't heard a symphony orchestra before, and I was so deeply impressed I said I have to be a conductor.

  Kurt Masur

  Symphony, Age, Orchestra

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• God comes to us in theater in the way we communicate with each other, whether it be a symphony orchestra, or a wonderful ballet, or a beautiful painting, or a play. It's a way of expressing our humanity.

  Julie Harris

  Beautiful, Play, Symphony

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• You can't play a symphony alone, it takes an orchestra to play it.

  Navjot Singh Sidhu

  Play, Symphony, Orchestra

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• My soul is a hidden orchestra; I know not what instruments, what fiddlestrings and harps, drums and tamboura I sound and clash inside myself. All I hear is the symphony.

  Fernando Pessoa

  Symphony, Soul, Sound

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• When the bright angel dominates, out comes a great work of art, a Michelangelo David or a Beethoven symphony.

  Madeleine L'Engle

  Art, Angel, Symphony

  Madeleine L'Engle (2017). “A Severed Wasp: A Novel”, p.112, Open Road Media

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• The very day I purchased it, I christened my guitar as my monophonic symphony, six string orchestra.

  Harry Chapin

  Guitar, Symphony, Orchestra

  Song: Six String Orchestra, 1974

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• Have you seen a symphony orchestra? There is a person at the back carrying a triangle. Now and again the conductor will point to him or her and that person will play "ting." That might seem so insignificant, but in the conception of the composer something irreplaceable would be lost to the total beauty of the symphony if that "ting" did not happen.

  Desmond Tutu

  Play, Symphony, Community

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• The symphony orchestra had played poorly, so the conductor was in a bad mood. That night he beat his wife--because the music hadn't been beautiful enough.

  George Carlin

  Beautiful, Night, Symphony

  George Carlin (1998). “Brain Droppings”, Hyperion

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• Few tears will be shed over the demise of the East German army, but what about East Germany’s eighty symphony orchestras, bound to lose some subsidies? Or the whole East German system, which covered everyone in a security blanket from day care to health care, from housing to education? Some people are beginning to express, if ever so slightly, nostalgia for that Berlin Wall.

  Bob Simon

  Wall, Army, Day Care

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• Consciousness is somehow a by-product of the simultaneous, high frequency firing of neurons in different parts of the brain. It's the meshing of these frequencies that generates consciousness, just as tones from individual instruments produce the rich, complex, & seamless sounds of a symphony orchestra

  Francis Crick

  Inspiration, Symphony, Brain

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• A man must pay the fiddler. In my case it so happened that a whole symphony orchestra often had to be subsidized.

  John Barrymore

  Men, Symphony, Orchestra

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• Duke Ellington's career traces the entire history of jazz. The repertoire associated with him contains the most important elements in the music and provides concrete examples of some of the best ways to present the music in the widest variety of settings-radio, TV, recordings, movies, concert halls, festivals, solo, small ensemble, big band, symphony orchestra, opera, Broadway shows.... You name it, he did it!

  Billy Taylor

  Names, Careers, Symphony

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• I never shied away from a challenge and I love doing big, epic films. They're interesting to me just on a pure music level, just in terms of the amount of music I could create for a symphony orchestra and chorus.

  Howard Shore

  Epic, Symphony, Interesting

  Source: collider.com

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• To me it's no accident that all the symphony orchestras around the world tune up to the note A. And A is 440 cycles, except in Germany where it's 444. But the universe is 450 cycles. So what I'm trying to say is, I think it's God's voice, melody especially. Counterpoint, retrograde inversion, harmony... that's the science and the craft.

  Quincy Jones

  Thinking, Voice, Symphony

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• I have had much pleasure in working with Orphei Drängar during my time as chief conductor of the Gothenburg Symphony Orchestra, and I consider OD to be one of the most brilliant men´s choirs in the world. The singers are highly professional and their repertoire is of a very wide range, but then they have been trained for years by Eric Ericson, the world´s leading choir conductor. I also admire the strength and the beauty of their voices. OD is an extraordinary powerful choir!

  Neeme Jarvi

  Powerful, Men, Years

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