Virgil Thomson famous quotes

Last updated: Sep 5, 2024

I said to my friends that if I was going to starve, I might as well starve where the food is good.
-- Virgil Thomson

#Food #Might #Said
Let your mind alone, and see what happens.
-- Virgil Thomson

#Mind
I never learned to verbalize an abstract musical concept. No thank you. The whole point of being a serious musician is to avoid verbalization whenever you can.
-- Virgil Thomson

#Thank You #Musical #Serious
The description and explanation is the best part of music reviewing. There is such a thing, and you know it too, as a gift for judgment. If you have it, you can say anything you like. If you haven't got it, you don't know you haven't got it.
-- Virgil Thomson

#Say Anything #Judgment #Description
Whatever deceptions life may have in store for you, music itself is not going to let you down.
-- Virgil Thomson

#Deception #May #Stores
Try a thing you haven't done three times. Once, to get over the fear of doing it. Twice, to learn how to do it. And a third time to figure out whether you like it or not.
-- Virgil Thomson

#Inspirational #Fear #Failure
Musicians own music because music owns them.
-- Virgil Thomson

#Musician
I got myself into a lovely little shall we say controversy with AndrÃ© Breton, by pointing out that the discipline of spontaneity, which he was asking his surrealist neophytes to adopt, was new for language but something that composers had been practicing for centuries.
-- Virgil Thomson

#Discipline #Lovely #Asking
A libretto that should never have been accepted on a subject that should never have been chosen bya man who should never have attempted it.
-- Virgil Thomson

#Men #Accepted #Should
I seem to write an opera about every 20 years; if you live long enough you can write four operas. I finished my third in 1970.
-- Virgil Thomson

#Writing #Years #Long
I don't care what other critics say, I only hope to be played.
-- Virgil Thomson

#Care
You explain how it went, and as far as you can figure out how it got that way.
-- Virgil Thomson

#Way #Figures
I don't go around regretting things that don't happen.
-- Virgil Thomson

#Regret
In Paris, you learn wit, in London you learn to crush your social rivals, and in Florence you learn poise.
-- Virgil Thomson

#Crush #Paris #Rivals
I've never known a musician who regretted being one. Music itself is not going to let you down.
-- Virgil Thomson

#Musician
Reviewing music or reviewing anything is a writing job. It's nice if you are experienced in the field you are writing about, but writing is what you are doing.
-- Virgil Thomson

#Jobs #Nice #Writing
The way to write American music is simple. All you have to do is be an American and then write any kind of music you wish.
-- Virgil Thomson

#Writing #Simple #Wish
Every composer's music reflects in its subject-matter and in its style the source of the money the composer is living on while writing the music.
-- Virgil Thomson

#Writing #Style #Matter

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