Richard Strauss Quotations

Never look at the trombones. You'll only encourage them.

The human voice is the most beautiful instrument of all, but it is the most difficult to play.

Never let the horns and woodwinds out of your sight; if you can hear them at all, they are too loud.

I may not be a first-rate composer, but I am a first-class second-rate composer.

Bear in mind that you are not making music for your own pleasure, but for the pleasure of your audience.

We've actually been at the low-end of the Street range for the fourth quarter ... (and) felt that we had to go even lower, so we did -- a nine percent across-the-board trimming here for the fourth quarter, ... The backlogs are still very significant, but the current environment is just not allowing deals to get done.

Building brand name is key. That's what America is all about,

It's a wonderful networking opportunity. I've definitely furthered deals. I meet high-level and influential people here, and it's a good way to touch base.

don't perspire while conducting - only the audience should get warm.

Its a funny thing Alice, dying is just the way I composed it in Tod und Verklärung.

The aria, after all, is the soul of opera.

Never look at the brass - it only encourages them.

He'd be better off shoveling snow.

Must one become seventy years old to recognize that one's greatest strength lies in creating musical kitsch?

Ideas, like young wine, should be put in storage and taken up again only after they have been allowed to ferment and to ripen.

I want to be able to depict in music a glass of beer so accurately that every listener can tell whether it is a Pilsner or a Kulmbacher.

The most perfect melodic shapes are found in Mozart; he has the lightness of touch which is the true objective ... Listen to the remarkable expansion of a Mozart melody, to Cherubino's 'Voi che sapete', for instance. You think it is coming to an end, but it goes farther, even farther.

If you think that the brass is not blowing loud enough, mute it by a couple of degrees.

Never look at the trombones, you'll just encourage them.

On conducting: If you can just barely hear the French horns on stage, the balance is perfect.

I shall never be converted, and I shall remain true to my old religion of the classics until my life's end.

The human voice is the most beautiful instrument of all, but the most difficult to play.