27 Jean Sibelius Quotes

Jean Sibelius quotes

1. If we understood the world, we would realize that there is a logic of harmony underlying its manifold apparent dissonances.

2. Music is for me like a beautiful mosaic which God has put together. He takes all the pieces in his hand, throws them into the world, and we have to recreate the picture from the pieces.

3. If I could express the same thing with words as with music, I would, of course, use a verbal expression. Music is something autonomous and much richer. Music begins where the possibilities of language end. That is why I write music.

4. Whereas most other modern composers are engaged in manufacturing cocktails of every hue and description, I offer the public pure cold water.

5. Never pay any attention to what critics say:Remember, a statue has never been set up in honour of a critic!

6. It is so difficult to mix with artists! You must choose business men to talk to, because artists only talk of money.

7. The framework of a symphony must be so strong that it forces you to follow it, regardless of the environment and circumstances.

8. I often conduct an orchestra in my sleep; my orchestras are so huge that the back desks of the violas vanish into the horizon. And everything is so wonderful.

9. Art is the signature of civilizations.

   Attribution disputed; shown as originally published.

10. In his work a means of escape has been found from outmoded romanticism on the one hand and from a barren objectivity on the other.

11. Sibelius is unquestionably a leader in the front rank of symphonic composers. He has got out of the ruts worn by his predecessors far more completely than Brahms got away from Beethoven, or even Richard Strauss from Wagner. If someone would only burn Finlandia he would come to our young people as an entirely original inventor of a new art form and a new harmony technique.

12. Sibelius has an acutely developed sense of identification with nature and a preoccupation with myth that at one and the same time define his unique strength and his basic limitation. These preoccupations override his involvement in the human predicament, except in so far as it affects man's relationship with nature.

1. Pay no attention to what the critics say. A statue has never been erected in honor of a critic.

2. Whereas most other modern composers are engaged in manufacturing cocktails of every hue and description, I offer the public cold spring water.

3. Pay no attention to what the critics say; no statue has ever been erected to a critic.

4. Music begins where the possibilities of language end.

5. For me, music begins where words end.

6. Millions of years ago, in my previous incarnations, I must have been related to swans... because I can still feel that affinity.

7. Pay no attention to what the critics say; no statue has ever been put up to a critic.

8. If you really put a small value upon yourself, rest assured that the world will not raise your price. Pay no attention to what the critics say. A statue has never been erected in honor of a critic.

9. No one ever erected a statue of a critic.

10. No statue has ever been put up to a critic.

11. Music is on a higher plane than everything else in this world.

12. Musicians talk of nothing but money and jobs. Give me businessmen every time. They really are interested in music and art

13. All the doctors who wanted to forbid me to smoke and to drink are dead,

14. “Pay no attention to what the critics say. A statue had never been erected in honor of a critic”

15. For an instant God opens his door and His orchestra plays the Fifth Symphony,