black
grey
blue
red
brown
white

The melody is generally what the piece is all about.

Aaron Copland

To stop the flow of music would be like the stopping of time itself, incredible and inconceivable.
AARON COPLAND

Flow Inconceivable Incredible Music Stop Time
You compose because you want to somehow summarize in some permanent form your most basic feelings about being alive, to set down some sort of permanent statement about the way it feels to live now, today.
AARON COPLAND

Alive Compose Feeling Live Permanent Today
Inspiration may be a form of superconsciousness, or perhaps of subconsciousness – I wouldn’t know. But I am sure it is the antithesis of self-consciousness.
AARON COPLAND

Art Inspirational Perhaps Self Subconscious Super
When I speak of the gifted listener, I am thinking of the nonmusician primarily, of the listener who intends to retain his amateur status. It is the thought of just such a listener that excites the composer in me.
AARON COPLAND

Gift Listener Listening Music Primarily Thinking
Mozart tapped the source from which all music flows, expressing himself with a spontaneity and refinement and breathtaking rightness.
AARON COPLAND

Breathtaking Express Flow Mozart Source Spontaneity Tap
I hope my recordings of my own works won’t inhibit other people’s performances. The brutal fact is that one doesn’t always get the exact tempo one wants, although one improves with experience.
AARON COPLAND

Brutal Fact People Want Recording Work
The main thing is to be satisfied with your work yourself. It’s useless to have an audience happy if you are not happy.
AARON COPLAND

Audience Happy Satisfied Useless
If one were asked to name one musician who came closest to composing without human flaw, I suppose general consensus would choose Johann Sebastian Bach.
AARON COPLAND

Ask Compose Flaw Human Musician Name
I don’t compose. I assemble materials.
AARON COPLAND

Assemble Compose Material
The melody is generally what the piece is all about.
AARON COPLAND

Generally Melody Piece
Arthur V. Berger commenting on the music of Aaron Copland: Here is at last an American that we may place unapologetically beside the great recognized creative figures of any other country.
AARON COPLAND

Comment Country Creativity Figure Music
This whole problem can be stated quite simply by asking, “Is there a meaning to music?” My answer to that would be, “Yes.” And “Can you state in so many words what the meaning is?” My answer to that would be, “No.”
AARON COPLAND

Answer Jazz Music Problem Quite Simply State
So long as the human spirit thrives on this planet, music in some living form will accompany and sustain it and give it expressive meaning.
AARON COPLAND

Giving Human Long Music Spirit Thrives
A melody is not merely something you can hum.
AARON COPLAND

Hum Melody Merely Something
A great symphony is a man-made Mississippi down which we irresistibly flow from the instant of our leave-taking to a long forseen destination.
AARON COPLAND

Flow Great Irresistibly Long Men Mississippi Symphony
Composers tend to assume that everyone loves music. Surprisingly enough, everyone doesn’t.
AARON COPLAND

Assuming Enough Love Music Surprise Tend

The melody is generally what the piece is all about.

Related Topics

Popular Authors

The melody is generally what the piece is all about.

Related Topics

Popular Authors

More Aaron Copland Quotes