Quote #20

' Rimsky-Korsakov used to say that he refused to acknowledge any complaints from composers about their hard lot in life. He explained his position thus: Talk to a bookkeeper and he'll start complaining about life and his work. Work has ruined him, it's so dull and boring. You see, the bookkeeper had planned to be a writer but life made him a bookkeeper. Rimsky-Korsakov said that it was rather different with composers. None of them can say that he had planned to be a bookkeeper and that life forced him to become a composer.'

More from Dmitri Shostakovich

  1. 'I always try to make myself as widely understood as possible; and if I don't succeed, I consider it my own fault.'
  2. 'For some reason, people think that music must tell us only about the pinnacles of the human spirit, or at least about highly romantic vill…
  3. I think it is clear to everyone what happens in the Fifth. The rejoicing is forced, created under threat, as in Boris Godunov. It's as if s…
  4. 'When a man is in despair, it means that he still believes in something.'
  5. Jewish folk music has made a most powerful impression on me. I never tire of delighting in it, it's multifaceted, it can appear to be happy…
  6. 'I write music, it's performed. After all, my music says it all. It doesn't need historical and hysterical commentaries. In the long run, a…
  7. The majority of my symphonies are tombstones.
  8. 'What you have in your head, put it down on paper. The head is a fragile vessel.'

All Dmitri Shostakovich quotes