Truth exists for the wise; beauty
for the susceptible heart.
They belong together –
are complementary.
( Beethoven )
From the heart …
may it reach the heart.
( Beethoven, inscribed at the
start of his Missa Solemnis )
My heart beats in love
for the great and lofty art
of this ancestral father of harmony.
( Beethoven, on Bach )
The composing of fugues is the art
of making musical skeletons.
( Beethoven )
Beethoven
is now ripe for the madhouse.
( Carl Maria von Weber,
on hearing Beethoven’s Seventh Symphony )
You can't possibly listen
to the last movement of
Beethoven's Seventh and go slow.
( Oscar Levant, explaining his way
out of a speeding ticket )
Music ought to strike fire
from the soul of man.
( Beethoven )
People whose sensibility
is destroyed by music in trains,
airports and elevators,
cannot concentrate
on a Beethoven quartet.
( Lutoslawski )
If Beethoven's Seventh Symphony
is not by some means abridged,
it will soon fall into disuse.
( Boston Music Critic )
Joy follows sorrow; sunshine, rain
( Beethoven )
Nature is a glorious school for the heart!
( Beethoven )
Expression of feeling rather than painting.
( Beethoven, the motto of his own 6th Symphony )
No one should ever drive a hard bargain
with an artist.
( Beethoven )
Art and science only can raise a man to godhood.
( Beethoven )
Art demands of us that we do not stand still.
( Beethoven )
Nothing is more intolerable
than to have to admit to yourself your own errors.
( Beethoven )
The true artist finds profound delight
in grand productions of genius.
( Beethoven )
True Art is selfish and inflexible –
it will not submit to the mold of flattery.
( Beethoven )
Handel is the greatest of us all,
the unattained master of all masters,
the greatest composer that ever lived.
I would uncover my head and kneel on his grave.
Go and learn from him how to achieve vast effects
with simple means.
( Beethoven )
Truly a divine spark dwells in Schubert.
( Beethoven )
Among all the composers alive,
Cherubini is the most worthy of respect.
( Beethoven )
The great artist was rooted in a great man.
( Alfred Einstein, on Beethoven )
He [Beethoven] first fills the soul with sweet melancholy
and then shatters it by a mass of barbarous chords.
He seems to harbor together doves and crocodiles.
( Paris Music Critic )
Rossini would have become a great compose
if his teacher had frequently applied some blows ad posteriora.
( Beethoven )
The barriers are not erected
which can say to aspiring talents and industry,
"Thus far and no farther."
( Beethoven )
A caricature of Haydn pushed to absurdity.
( One critic on Beethoven’s First Symphony )
A gross enormity, an immense wounded snake,
unwilling to die, but writhing in its last agonies,
and (in the Finale) bleeding to death.
( a critic in Leipzig, on Beethoven’s Second Symphony )
[I find] the theme of the First Movement
wanting in dignity, the Trio of the Scherzo
too grotesque, and the last movement
replete with unmeaning babble.
( Louis Spohr, in his autobiography,
on Beethoven’s Fifth Symphony )
The scoring lacks color, as does the harmony,
which is limited almost entirely to its architectural function.
( Virgil Thompson, on Beethoven’s Missa Solemnis )
Beethoven’s Fifth Symphony is the most sublime noise
that has ever penetrated into the ears of man.
( EM Forster )
If someone conducts a Beethoven performance
and doesn't have to go to the osteopath,
then there's something wrong.
( Simon Rattle )
Beethoven is a genius able to dispense with taste.
Mozart, his equal in genius, has, in addition,
the most delicate taste.
( Debussy )
For me the greatest of all composers is Mozart.
Mozart is perfection; he is Grecian,
whereas Beethoven is Roman.
The Greek is great, the Roman is Colossal.
I prefer the great.
( Ravel )
The Ninth Symphony
is the most triumphant example
of the molding of an idea to the preconceived form.
This music sprang from a soul drunk with liberty.
( Debussy, Beethoven’s Ninth Symphony )
The stern and loyal mastery of our great Beethoven
easily triumphed over this vague
and high-flown charlatanism [of Wagner].
( Debussy )
The true lesson taught by Beethoven
was not the preserving of the ancient forms;
rather, he would invite us to gaze
through the open window
to the clear sky.
( Debussy )
Music was never for Massenet
the cosmic voice heard by Bach and Beethoven.
( Debussy )
Beethoven can write music, thank God,
but he can do nothing else on earth.
( Beethoven )
An utterly untamed creature.
( Goethe, on Beethoven )
What he demanded of society was the wherewithal
to work unhindered, and he demanded it as a right,
knowing how much he had to give in return.
( Alfred Einstein, on Beethoven )
I often compose three, even four, pieces simultaneously.
( Beethoven )
I have always reckoned myself
among the greatest admirers of Mozart,
and shall do so until the day of my death.
( Beethoven )
Music is the mediator
between the spiritual and the sensual.
( Beethoven )
In spite of all, we may say of Beethoven,
as has been said of Handel,
great even in his mistakes.
( One critic on Beethoven’s Ninth Symphony )
Hate reacts on those who nourish it.
( Beethoven )
How stupidity and wretchedness always go in pairs.
( Beethoven )
Habit may depreciate the most brilliant talents.
( Beethoven )
I shall grapple with Fate;
it shall not quite bear me down.
( Beethoven )
I, too, am a King!
( Beethoven )
I would much rather come to visit you and your family
than many rich persons who betray themselves
with the poverty of their inner selves.
( In a letter to an eight-year old girl,
who was an ardent fan )
I carry my thoughts about me for a long time,
often a very long time, before I write them down.
I make changes, reject and reattempt
until I am satisfied.
( Beethoven )
I despise a world
which does not intuitively feel
that music is a higher revelation
than all wisdom and philosophy.