Verdi Music Quotes & Sayings

I love music, especially classical like Verdi; it's a great way to relax. — David Suchet

In case you're unfamiliar with TED, it is a series of short lectures on a variety of subjects that stream on the Internet for free. — Alex Pareene

She says, he is a great soul. - A great bladder for dried peas to rattle in! said Mrs. Cadwallader. — George Eliot

I order that my funeral ceremonies be extremely modest, and that they take place at dawn or at the evening Ave Maria, without song or music. — Giuseppe Verdi

If it really was Queen Elizabeth who demanded to see Falstaff in a comedy, then she showed herself a very perceptive critic. But even in The Merry Wives of Windsor, Falstaff has not and could not have found his true home because Shakespeare was only a poet. For that he was to wait nearly two hundred years till Verdi wrote his last opera. Falstaff is not the only case of a character whose true home is the world of music; others are Tristan, Isolde and Don Giovanni. — W. H. Auden

This is my Italy, she thought. The power and beauty of the antiquities, the detailed frescos, the imposing statuaries carved of milk white granite, Don Martinelli's hammered gold chalice, the glorious tones of the music, the Italy of Puccini and Verdi, Caruso and Toscanini, not the Italy of the shattered spirits in Hoboken and the drunken, desperate Anna Buffa. This was the Italy that fed her soul, where hope was restored and broken hearts were mended in the hands of great artists. — Adriana Trigiani

Every spring
I hear the thrush singing
in the glowing woods
he is only passing through.
His voice is deep,
then he lifts it until it seems
to fall from the sky.
I am thrilled.
I am grateful.
Then, by the end of morning,
he's gone, nothing but silence
out of the tree
where he rested for a night.
And this I find acceptable.
Not enough is a poor life.
But too much is, well, too much.
Imagine Verdi or Mahler
every day, all day.
It would exhaust anyone. — Mary Oliver

I am an arrogant and impatient listener, but in the case of a few composers, a very few, when I hear a work I do not like, I am convinced that it is my own fault. Verdi is one of those composers. — Benjamin Britten

science cannot be regarded as an entirely detached, disinterested enterprise. To undertake scientific inquiry itself reflects a certain kind of commitment and a certain judgment about what is worth doing. Deciding what kind of scientific inquiry to conduct and how to carry it out requires further evaluative deliberation. Whatever further roles contextual values might play, the securing of evidence and the susceptibility of conclusions to error-probing and transformative criticism demand that those roles be laid bare. For such an undertaking, a partnership of philosophers and scientists may prove fruitful, or even essential. — Kent W. Staley

Unlike 'real relationships', 'virtual relationships' are easy to enter and to exit. They look smart and clean, feel easy to use, when compared with the heavy, slow-moving, messy real stuff. — Zygmunt Bauman

A singer whose ear is singly directed to the melodic aspects of a Brahms lied or a Verdi aria lacks perception of the musical web from which the melodic line emerges; the composer's intent may remain unrealized. to sing Schubert, Schumann, Brahms, Wolf, or Strauss lieder without an understanding of underlying harmonic structures is to vocalize on them, not to conceive of them musically and emotionally. — Richard Miller

Dramaturgically, you always hear that you want to see things in the moment, you want to see things happen, you don't want to talk about things, but with "Friends," it was more fun when they talked about it. — Marta Kauffman

Sisterhood is powerful. It kills. Mostly sisters. — Ti-Grace Atkinson

The only thing that interests me in music is to be able to reach into the, let's call it, 'collective unconscious' of what is noblest in the human spirit, the way you find in the music of Mozart and Beethoven and Verdi that wonderful quality that not a note can be changed. — Gian Carlo Menotti

Of all composers, past and present, I am the least learned. I mean that in all seriousness, and by learning I do not mean knowledge of music. — Giuseppe Verdi

To copy the truth can be a good thing, but to invent the truth is better, much better. — Giuseppe Verdi

Which, is a great thing - mostly. Ah, fame, — Gayle Forman

I always wanted to start a public company and make a lot of money. — Martin Shkreli

People who mattered could not take the humdrum world. But this was not the world, it was enchantment; and all of it was mine. — Daphne Du Maurier

petraries and mangonels. Then, at vesper time, — Geoffroi De Villehardouin

Composers are influenced by all the important music in their lives - and I suppose that since radio started playing popular music, that's as likely to be The Beatles or Aphex Twin as it is to be Verdi or Ravel. — Jonny Greenwood

When I brought my first premature baby home, I was more than hypervigilant. I was afraid that if I stopped watching her, she would stop breathing and die. So I stared at her like a hawk, even peeking when I showered. After a few weeks of no sleep and constant anxiety, I realized I couldn't go on like this forever. So I got on my knees and cried. Then I asked God if He would watch over her while I slept. I had forgotten that God was already watching over both of us. — Janene Wolsey Baadsgaard

Self-pity gets you nowhere. But insight to see that something can be done with the second-bests and adventurous daring to try might be a handle to take hold of. — Harry Emerson Fosdick