My favorite one is:
"You can get a lot of notes out if you narrow your embouchure and close all other exits from your body."
-Fintan Vallely - flute teacher (at the Friday Harbour Music Camp 2008)
One night the great jazz saxophonist, Zoot Sims, was so drunk on stage he was leaning against the piano while playing. However, his playing was fabulous. On the break, one of the othe musicians asked "Zoot, how can you be so drunk and play so well?". he replied " I practice drunk!"
When describing that a certain person was not using much of the bow a man in Woodford Co.Galway who shall remain nameless said" An inch of the bow would last him till christmas"
An old West Clare fiddler remarked when someone mentioned a local old lady who had recently taken to learning the fiddle and said 'She has a lot of tunes in her head'. 'Yes and wouldn't it be great if they stayed there'
The music business is a cruel and shallow money trench, a long plastic hallway where thieves and pimps run free, and good men die like dogs. There's also a negative side.
Hunter S. Thompson
"For even that vulgar and tavern music, which makes one man merry, and another mad, strikes me in a deep fit of devotion, and a profound contemplation of the first Composer, there is something in it of divinity more than the ear discovers"
.. reckon that he must have been to a few pub sessions ...
"The man that hath no music in himself,
Nor is not mov'd with concord of sweet sounds,
Is fit for treasons, stratagems, and spoils;
The motions of his spirit are dull as night,
And his affections dark as Erebus:
Let no such man be trusted."
Here's an appropriate one from Ireland's ancient Brehon laws:
"The harpist is the only musician who is of noble standing. Flute-players, trumpeters and timpanists, as well as jugglers, conjurers and equestrians who stand on the backs of horses at fairs, have no status of their own in the community, only that of the noble chieftain to whom they are attached."
"Information is not knowledge. Knowledge is not wisdom.
Wisdom is not truth. Truth is not beauty. Beauty is not love.
Love is not music. Music is best." - Frank Zappa
And, on a lighter note,
"Do you know your monkey's just p**sed in my beer?"
Rook, reminds me of the time I played in the band for a St George's Day dance (yes I know but the money was good) when an old buffer in regimental blazer and tie (and you can use your imagination here - the absolute stereotype) says to me in a fine semi sozzled voice,
"When you going to stop playing all this diddly diddly stuff and play some proper English music".
Imagine my delight when I was able to inform him (truthfully and with a perfectly straight face) that we had not played a single Irish tune but everything was English traditional dance music as was appropriate for the day. Hee Hee. I suppose he was expecting The Dambusters March or Souza or similar military type tunes.
.....but the EMI vinyl remaster of Joe's Garage is even better!
Here's another good one from yer man FZ:
"I'll tell you what classical music is — for those of you who don't know. Classical music is this music that was written by a bunch of dead people a long time ago. And it's formula music, the same as top forty music is formula music. In order to have a piece be classical, it has to conform to academic standards that were the current norms of that day and age ... I think that people are entitled to be amused, and entertained. If they see deviations from this classical norm, it's probably good for their mental health."
That's they type of sentiment that really got the AMA's panties in a bunch. I think honesty like that threatens their job security.
"I'm sure you didn't know, but that's actually a lovely tune you played just now." This, and the two above were favorite jabs dealt out by a flute player from Clare who came among us during the '70s and '80's. He's since gone back home to be a postman in Lahinch. Were still smarting.
"We also have sound-houses, where we practise and demonstrate all sounds and their generation. We have harmonies, which you have not, of quarter-tones, and lesser slides of sounds; divers instruments likewise to you unknown, some sweeter than any you have; with bells and rings that are dainty and sweet. We represent small sounds as great and deep, likewise great sounds extenuate and sharp. We make divers tremblings and warblings of sounds, which in their original are entire; we represent and imitate all articulate sounds and letters, and the voices and notes of beasts and birds. We have certain helps, which set to the ear do further the hearing greatly. We also have divers strange and artificial echos reflecting the voice many times, and as it were tossing it; and some that give back the voice louder than it came, some shriller, and some deeper; yea, some rendering the voice differing in the letters or articulate sound from that they receive. We have also means to convey sounds in trunks and pipes in strange lines and distances."
... Sir Francis Bacon in his novel "New Atlantis" (1626), apparently foreseeing much of today's audio technology, both hardware and software. However, as far as today's patents are concerned, it is hardly an "enabling disclosure", but nevertheless an enormous imaginative leap.
Don Burrows, a popular Australian Jazz flute player, well regarded for his powers of improvisation, when asked for a number he didn't know:
"Hum me the first few bars. You won't recognise it after that."
An orchestral conductor:
"Shoenberg? No, I don't think we've ever played any. Trod in some once ..."
Flute maker Sam Murray, after I commented that they played very fast at the previous night's session I'd attended:
"Ah, Belfast Powerdiddle".
Old Irish player witnessing the massacre of a tune:
"Ah, don't mind him. He's interfering with something he doesn't understand".
Handel, loudly from the audience, in a concert where the harpsichordist has extemporised off in modulation after modulation and finally manages to return to the original theme and key:
Banjoburger, "divers" is the word Francis Bacon used in the early 17th century. It is an archaic spelling of "diverse", and in the context of what Francis Bacon wrote it meant "various".
Sorry, I'm coming in a bit late, but I just heard this one from a session mate: Sometimes the real musician is the one not playing... Thanks, Paul!
...and there's this, related by Charles Cooke (longtime writer/reporter for The New Yorker) in "Playing the Piano For Pleasure":
Leopold Godowski and Josef Hofmann (old famous classical guys) were at a party and were approached by a piano playing guest, who remarked "...what small hands you have, Dr. Hofmann!" Then, "And yours too, Mr. Godowski! How in the world, gentlemen, can you great artists play the piano so magnificently with such small hands?" Godowski replied: "Where in the world, madam, did you get the idea that we play the piano with our hands?"
G.S.McLennan - the Aberdeen piper and composer of the "Jig of Slurs", "The Little Cascade", "Conan Bridge" and many other classic tunes was asked his opinion on a march which one of his students had composed.
"Aye, Willie - it's mair clever than musical !".
Following the death of Matt Armour, the landlord of the pub where he ran the singaround/session was asked 'should we have a two minute silence before the session in memory of Matt?'
'How about two hours' came the reply. If you knew Matt you would have known he would have laughed fit to bust.
For those who knew him his funeral is Thursday 26th Feburary in Stony Stratford.
see http://mattarmour.co.uk
R.I.P.
Great music quotes
Great music quotes
My favorite one is:
"You can get a lot of notes out if you narrow your embouchure and close all other exits from your body."
-Fintan Vallely - flute teacher (at the Friday Harbour Music Camp 2008)
# Posted on February 13th 2009 by keyedup
Re: Great music quotes
"Bowing is easy: either the bow goes up, or it goes down".
Kevin Burke
# Posted on February 13th 2009 by Henk Bos
Re: Great music quotes
There's the one attributed to Finbarr Furey, when aked why he played so fast:
" Because I f****** CAN! "
# Posted on February 13th 2009 by nicholas
Re: Great music quotes
..."asked"...
# Posted on February 13th 2009 by nicholas
Re: Great music quotes
One night the great jazz saxophonist, Zoot Sims, was so drunk on stage he was leaning against the piano while playing. However, his playing was fabulous. On the break, one of the othe musicians asked "Zoot, how can you be so drunk and play so well?". he replied " I practice drunk!"
# Posted on February 13th 2009 by musicstudent
Re: Great music quotes
When hearing others discussing learning tunes, Danny Holmes (Brisbane) said "it's either up or down, long or short, what's so hard about that?"
# Posted on February 13th 2009 by keyedup
Re: Great music quotes
"There are no notes on a banjo. You just play it" -- Anon. old timer
# Posted on February 13th 2009 by fidkid
Re: Great music quotes
When describing that a certain person was not using much of the bow a man in Woodford Co.Galway who shall remain nameless said" An inch of the bow would last him till christmas"
# Posted on February 13th 2009 by Pio Ryan
Re: Great music quotes
An old West Clare fiddler remarked when someone mentioned a local old lady who had recently taken to learning the fiddle and said 'She has a lot of tunes in her head'. 'Yes and wouldn't it be great if they stayed there'
# Posted on February 13th 2009 by Prof. Prlwytzkofski
Re: Great music quotes
A friend of mine, a native Irish speaker - English being his second language, was enthusing about some music he had been listening to.
"Ah I tell you, it was great music, 'twould make the water stand out in your eyes"
# Posted on February 13th 2009 by john knoss
Re: Great music quotes
Often quoted, but still great: Mark Twain: "Wagner's music is better than it sounds."
# Posted on February 13th 2009 by grego
Re: Great music quotes
Overheard at the Willy Clancy late night on Tom Malones field (when everyone used to camp on it)
A friend who shall remain nameless talking to a pretty young flute player.
He.... "How are you getting on with the flute Mary"
She....".Well, I can get all the notes, but I'm having problems with my blowing".
He...."Come back to my tent and we can practise together!!"
# Posted on February 14th 2009 by banjoburger
Re: Great music quotes
The music business is a cruel and shallow money trench, a long plastic hallway where thieves and pimps run free, and good men die like dogs. There's also a negative side.
Hunter S. Thompson
# Posted on February 14th 2009 by bodhran bliss
Re: Great music quotes
Hi Debs, good to hear you're still alive. And learning the B/C box no less!
I still love that one about people who play diddly music in the classical, strict tempo style:
"They have all of the notes, and none of the music"
# Posted on February 14th 2009 by bc_box_player
Re: Great music quotes
Louis Armtrong:
"All music is folk music. I ain't never heard a horse sing a song. "
and many more at this address..
http://afroamhistory.about.com/od/louisarmstrong/a/armstrongquotes.htm
# Posted on February 14th 2009 by gravelwalks
Re: Great music quotes
another from the same man, ont he same site:
"Never play a thing the same way twice. "
Good advice.
# Posted on February 14th 2009 by gravelwalks
Re: Great music quotes
"I know two tunes.... of them them is Yankee Doodle, and the other one isn't." - U.S. Grant
# Posted on February 14th 2009 by WireHarp
Re: Great music quotes
A painter paints pictures on canvas. But musicians paint their pictures on silence. ~Leopold Stokowski
# Posted on February 14th 2009 by davydd
Re: Great music quotes
"I thank you in advance for the great round of applause I am about to get." Bo Diddley
"Flint must be an extremely wealthy town; I see that each of you bought two or three seats." -Victor Borge to a half-full theatre in Flint, Michigan
# Posted on February 14th 2009 by Glass of Beer
Re: Great music quotes
"If music be the food of love, play on,
Give me excess of it; that surfeiting,
The appetite may sicken, and so die."
William Shakespeare
Twelfth Night
Act 1, scene 1, 1–3
# Posted on February 14th 2009 by Mix O'Lydian
Re: Great music quotes
Here's one from Sir Thomas Browne (1605-1682)
"For even that vulgar and tavern music, which makes one man merry, and another mad, strikes me in a deep fit of devotion, and a profound contemplation of the first Composer, there is something in it of divinity more than the ear discovers"
.. reckon that he must have been to a few pub sessions ...
# Posted on February 14th 2009 by Mix O'Lydian
Re: Great music quotes
Recommendation of aural/oral methods of learning from the bard ?
"First, rehearse your song by rote
To each word a warbling note"
Midsummer Nights Dream Act 5 Scene 1.
# Posted on February 14th 2009 by David50
Re: Great music quotes
More Shakespeare ... (Merchant of Venice)
"The man that hath no music in himself,
Nor is not mov'd with concord of sweet sounds,
Is fit for treasons, stratagems, and spoils;
The motions of his spirit are dull as night,
And his affections dark as Erebus:
Let no such man be trusted."
Q. Was he referrring to bodhran players, perhaps?
# Posted on February 14th 2009 by Mix O'Lydian
Re: Great music quotes
What about this one, from "the King"
"I don't know anything about music. In my line you don't have to."
(Elvis Presley).
# Posted on February 14th 2009 by Mix O'Lydian
Re: Great music quotes
Here's an appropriate one from Ireland's ancient Brehon laws:
"The harpist is the only musician who is of noble standing. Flute-players, trumpeters and timpanists, as well as jugglers, conjurers and equestrians who stand on the backs of horses at fairs, have no status of their own in the community, only that of the noble chieftain to whom they are attached."
# Posted on February 14th 2009 by Mix O'Lydian
Re: Great music quotes
"Can you play solo? So low I can't hear you?" - My Dad
# Posted on February 14th 2009 by SWFL Fiddler
Re: Great music quotes
Or maybe:
"Can you play: 'Over the Hills and Far Away'?"
# Posted on February 14th 2009 by Mix O'Lydian
Re: Great music quotes
Said to me, after listening to me play irish tunes on whistle, by the man who became my first whistle and fiddle teacher:
"Do you know any Irish music?"
Cheers.
# Posted on February 14th 2009 by Piece
Re: Great music quotes
"Classical music is the kind that we keep hoping will turn into a tune."
-Kin Hubbard
"You don't have to practice every day, only on the days that you eat"
-I can't remember who said it.
# Posted on February 14th 2009 by dannym
Re: Great music quotes
Play that tune "Over by the Door" and I'll help you out.
# Posted on February 14th 2009 by Donough
Re: Great music quotes
"Information is not knowledge. Knowledge is not wisdom.
Wisdom is not truth. Truth is not beauty. Beauty is not love.
Love is not music. Music is best." - Frank Zappa
And, on a lighter note,
"Do you know your monkey's just p**sed in my beer?"
"No, son, you hum it and I'll play it."
# Posted on February 14th 2009 by MacCruiskeen
Re: Great music quotes
Rook, reminds me of the time I played in the band for a St George's Day dance (yes I know but the money was good) when an old buffer in regimental blazer and tie (and you can use your imagination here - the absolute stereotype) says to me in a fine semi sozzled voice,
"When you going to stop playing all this diddly diddly stuff and play some proper English music".
Imagine my delight when I was able to inform him (truthfully and with a perfectly straight face) that we had not played a single Irish tune but everything was English traditional dance music as was appropriate for the day. Hee Hee. I suppose he was expecting The Dambusters March or Souza or similar military type tunes.
# Posted on February 14th 2009 by john knoss
Re: Great music quotes
My dearly departed Dad on hearing a bowed psaltery for the first time,
"Sounds like a mouse piddlin' in a tin dish."
# Posted on February 14th 2009 by john knoss
Re: Great music quotes
"The harp and the fiddle, the fife and the lambeg drum, two proud traditions are coming together in the harmonies of peace" - Bill Clinton
Was always delighted that the Northern Ireland peace process managed to survived this
# Posted on February 14th 2009 by portnasaol
Re: Great music quotes
Yes I agree "music is the best."
.....but the EMI vinyl remaster of Joe's Garage is even better!
Here's another good one from yer man FZ:
"I'll tell you what classical music is — for those of you who don't know. Classical music is this music that was written by a bunch of dead people a long time ago. And it's formula music, the same as top forty music is formula music. In order to have a piece be classical, it has to conform to academic standards that were the current norms of that day and age ... I think that people are entitled to be amused, and entertained. If they see deviations from this classical norm, it's probably good for their mental health."
That's they type of sentiment that really got the AMA's panties in a bunch. I think honesty like that threatens their job security.
# Posted on February 14th 2009 by gravelwalks
Re: Great music quotes
"I don't understand that music. It's all in Irish!"
# Posted on February 14th 2009 by Well Boi
Re: Great music quotes
:Thank God there's no smell!"-
-Oscar Wilde on bagpipe music
# Posted on February 14th 2009 by pipewatcher
Re: Great music quotes
"Do you take requests?"
"Sure- what would you like to hear?"
"Oh, anything at all will be just fine."
"Is the concertina hard to play? Not at all. You just have to put your fingers in the right places."
# Posted on February 14th 2009 by David Levine
Re: Great music quotes
"A good old tune will never age as fast as a bad new one".
# Posted on February 14th 2009 by Kenny
Re: Great music quotes
One told to me by someone from England who was playing Bluegrass in a village event and approached by a rather upper-crust woman:
Woman: Tell me, what sort of music is that?
Musician: It's called Bluegrass
Woman: It's perfectly ghastly.
# Posted on February 14th 2009 by Mark Harmer
Re: Great music quotes
"If you put in what you left out and left out what you put in to that tune you played just now,....."
# Posted on February 15th 2009 by Atahualpa Quigley
Re: Great music quotes
"You seem to be enjoying yourself."
# Posted on February 15th 2009 by Atahualpa Quigley
Re: Great music quotes
"I'm sure you didn't know, but that's actually a lovely tune you played just now." This, and the two above were favorite jabs dealt out by a flute player from Clare who came among us during the '70s and '80's. He's since gone back home to be a postman in Lahinch. Were still smarting.
# Posted on February 15th 2009 by Atahualpa Quigley
Re: Great music quotes
You dissapoint me Bliss?????
What about all the gems that have taken place within our own group??
Man(possibly tourist?) in awe of whistle player
"How do you play that?"
Whistle player
"You F*ckin blow it!"
........................
"you can play all you want but you're not getting f*cking paid!"
....................
"Never underestimate the ability to gulder a raucous song"
# Posted on February 15th 2009 by jfiddlerh
Re: Great music quotes
"There's nothing remarkable about it. All one has to do is hit the right keys at the right time and the instrument plays itself."
J.S. Bach
# Posted on February 15th 2009 by Rick Payman
Re: Great music quotes
"There's nothing remarkable about it. All one has to do is hit the right keys at the right time and the instrument plays itself."
I'll try that.
# Posted on February 15th 2009 by CreadurMawnOrganig
Re: Great music quotes
"Why do you need the dots when you have a recording?"
# Posted on February 15th 2009 by fidkid
Re: Great music quotes
fidkid, we know the source. he's great when he gets wound up;
http://www.thesession.org/discussions/display/12326/comments#comment251380
# Posted on February 15th 2009 by Ben Steen
Re: Great music quotes
"We also have sound-houses, where we practise and demonstrate all sounds and their generation. We have harmonies, which you have not, of quarter-tones, and lesser slides of sounds; divers instruments likewise to you unknown, some sweeter than any you have; with bells and rings that are dainty and sweet. We represent small sounds as great and deep, likewise great sounds extenuate and sharp. We make divers tremblings and warblings of sounds, which in their original are entire; we represent and imitate all articulate sounds and letters, and the voices and notes of beasts and birds. We have certain helps, which set to the ear do further the hearing greatly. We also have divers strange and artificial echos reflecting the voice many times, and as it were tossing it; and some that give back the voice louder than it came, some shriller, and some deeper; yea, some rendering the voice differing in the letters or articulate sound from that they receive. We have also means to convey sounds in trunks and pipes in strange lines and distances."
... Sir Francis Bacon in his novel "New Atlantis" (1626), apparently foreseeing much of today's audio technology, both hardware and software. However, as far as today's patents are concerned, it is hardly an "enabling disclosure", but nevertheless an enormous imaginative leap.
# Posted on February 15th 2009 by Trevor Jennings
Re: Great music quotes
Don Burrows, a popular Australian Jazz flute player, well regarded for his powers of improvisation, when asked for a number he didn't know:
"Hum me the first few bars. You won't recognise it after that."
An orchestral conductor:
"Shoenberg? No, I don't think we've ever played any. Trod in some once ..."
Flute maker Sam Murray, after I commented that they played very fast at the previous night's session I'd attended:
"Ah, Belfast Powerdiddle".
Old Irish player witnessing the massacre of a tune:
"Ah, don't mind him. He's interfering with something he doesn't understand".
Handel, loudly from the audience, in a concert where the harpsichordist has extemporised off in modulation after modulation and finally manages to return to the original theme and key:
"Welcome home, Mr Dubould, welcome home!"
Terry
# Posted on February 15th 2009 by Terry McGee
Re: Great music quotes
Is that meant to be 'diverse', lazyhound, or is it really all about aqualungs and flippers??..
# Posted on February 15th 2009 by banjoburger
Re: Great music quotes
Banjoburger, "divers" is the word Francis Bacon used in the early 17th century. It is an archaic spelling of "diverse", and in the context of what Francis Bacon wrote it meant "various".
# Posted on February 15th 2009 by Trevor Jennings
Re: Great music quotes
I heard a good Kevin Burke quote yesterday.
When asked by an aficionado about the intricacies of his Bowing, he is said to have replied:
"Well my bow is either going up ........ or it's going down!"
Or words to that effect.
# Posted on February 15th 2009 by Ptarmigan
Re: Great music quotes
I swim corrected!!
# Posted on February 15th 2009 by banjoburger
Re: Great music quotes
Sorry, I'm coming in a bit late, but I just heard this one from a session mate: Sometimes the real musician is the one not playing... Thanks, Paul!
...and there's this, related by Charles Cooke (longtime writer/reporter for The New Yorker) in "Playing the Piano For Pleasure":
Leopold Godowski and Josef Hofmann (old famous classical guys) were at a party and were approached by a piano playing guest, who remarked "...what small hands you have, Dr. Hofmann!" Then, "And yours too, Mr. Godowski! How in the world, gentlemen, can you great artists play the piano so magnificently with such small hands?" Godowski replied: "Where in the world, madam, did you get the idea that we play the piano with our hands?"
# Posted on February 15th 2009 by tomw
Re: Great music quotes
...or this, from Peter Barnes in his introduction to 'Interview with a Vamper':
"The piano. Eighty-eight little mistakes waiting to happen."
...or, from Groucho Marx:
"...he was classically trained, but not for long"
# Posted on February 15th 2009 by tomw
Re: Great music quotes
"I'm playing all the right notes.....but not necessarily in the right order" ........Eric Morecambe[RIP]
# Posted on February 16th 2009 by Kenny
Re: Great music quotes
Told by John Kennedy of Antrim:
Visitor (after borrowing fiddle of the well-regarded fiddle player he is visiting, who is sick in bed): "There, I've played you all the tunes I know."
Bedridden fiddler: "I'm afraid you played me quite a few you don't know."
# Posted on February 16th 2009 by Jeeves Tones
Re: Great music quotes
G.S.McLennan - the Aberdeen piper and composer of the "Jig of Slurs", "The Little Cascade", "Conan Bridge" and many other classic tunes was asked his opinion on a march which one of his students had composed.
"Aye, Willie - it's mair clever than musical !".
# Posted on February 17th 2009 by Kenny
Re: Great music quotes
I know it's a bit late to weigh in on this thread, but here are my favorites:
Kevin Burke (when asked about teaching Irish music): "There are some things that can't be taught; they have to be learned."
And from the movie "The Boys from County Clare," the character John Joe McMahon: "When you've got the music, you've got friends for life."
# Posted on February 17th 2009 by print o' the wave
Re: Great music quotes
"Hooray for Ireland!" Kenny Hall
# Posted on February 18th 2009 by Leendah
Re: Great music quotes
Yes, I AM a great singer ... when alone in my car.
-Me-
# Posted on February 23rd 2009 by keyedup
Re: Great music quotes
Following the death of Matt Armour, the landlord of the pub where he ran the singaround/session was asked 'should we have a two minute silence before the session in memory of Matt?'
'How about two hours' came the reply. If you knew Matt you would have known he would have laughed fit to bust.
For those who knew him his funeral is Thursday 26th Feburary in Stony Stratford.
see http://mattarmour.co.uk
R.I.P.
I shall so miss him, my friend and inspiration.
# Posted on February 25th 2009 by john knoss
Re: Great music quotes
don't worry about earlyness i've never been late for anything in my life
'Without music life would be a mistake.'
Friedrich Nietzsche (1844-1900) German philosopher
# Posted on March 9th 2009 by lisaniska