Philharmonic Quotes

#1. Simplicity is always a virtue. One kid on a riverbank working out a Stephen Foster tune on his new harmonica heard from the correct esthetic distance projects more magic and power than the entire Vienna Philharmonic and Chorus laboring (once again) through the Mozart Requiem or Bach's B Minor Mass.

Edward Abbey

#2. The alarm in the morning? Well, I have an old tape of Carlo Maria Giulini conducting the Vienna Philharmonic Orchestra in a perfectly transcendent version in Shubert's seventh symphony. And I've rigged it up so that at exactly 7:30 every morning it falls from the ceiling onto my face.

Stephen Fry

#3. Ori Kam is an outstanding violist who has already played as a soloist with the Israel Philharmonic Orchestra twice, much to our delight and satisfaction, and has availed himself with distinction.

Zubin Mehta

#4. Some members of the Vienna Philharmonic convinced me to try Bruckner, which I have never done before. And that was interesting to me to have this experience with this orchestra, which knows the repertoire very well, and to be confronted with this knowledge, and to learn from them.

Pierre Boulez

#5. I can't imagine Jon Cryer performing with the New York Philharmonic isn't one of the signs of apocalypse.

Jon Cryer

#6. I absolutely love the Philharmonic. I also love rock guitar.

Trey Anastasio

#7. Hamburg is getting a new symbol with its new Elbe Philharmonic concert hall. Such an architecturally impressive building is built somewhere in the world maybe once every five years, if you're lucky.

Charles Landry

#8. What's happened - in our country, anyhow - is that the young people have shied away from the formality of the concert hall, that tie - and - tails philharmonic image.

Chuck Mangione

#9. I think I infuse the music with a new passion. Part of this is because I have fallen in love: I am in love with the New York Philharmonic. The chemistry has just been right. Beyond expectation.

Lorin Maazel

#10. To this day I am indulgent toward orchestras that are trying to lift themselves in the world, while critics are busy assuring them that they are not the Vienna Philharmonic and never will be.

Robertson Davies

#11. It is wonderful to see how happy all my friends in the LA Philharmonic are in their new home.

Emanuel Ax

#12. Open rehearsals reach people who might not otherwise hear the Philharmonic - people on fixed incomes, people who can't move easily at night, students.

Zubin Mehta

#13. If somebody had told me when I was starting composition in Helsinki in the '70s that I would end up in L.A. and to describe that journey, those 17 years with the philharmonic and building the hall and this and that, I would have said, "This is a fairy tale of the first order."

Esa-Pekka Salonen

#14. I think I drunk e-mailed the Auckland Philharmonic last night.

Antonia Murphy

#15. For years, Jazz At The Philharmonic albums were the only ones of their kind.

Norman Granz

#16. Essentially, the [New York] Philharmonic is just like any other orchestra-they all have the spirit of kids, and if you scratch away a little of the fatigue and cynicism, out comes a 17-year-old music student again, full of wonder, exuberance and a tremendous love of music.

Zubin Mehta

#17. There was an opinion expressed in the newspapers that, after 20 years, maybe the Israel Philharmonic should consider asking me to leave. I thought they might have a point, so I asked my orchestra. They told me overwhelmingly that they wanted me to stay.

Zubin Mehta

#18. The philharmonic became such a journey and adventure in my life, and a deeply satisfying thing.

Esa-Pekka Salonen

#19. My whole childhood was filled with classical music and going to concerts of the New York Philharmonic and other New York ensembles and organizations, but interestingly, I didn't become conscious of wanting to be a musician until I was about 11. I was a rather late starter.

Gunther Schuller

#20. I did a concert ... in September with the Berlin Philharmonic ... They're great musicians, and there's always something to learn from them.

Cecilia Bartoli

#21. It seems always to have been difficult to have been a New York Philharmonic conductor because of the nature of New York. We are in direct competition with the great orchestras in the world who come to play in our hall or in Carnegie, and we are constantly compared. I think that 's a good thing.

Zubin Mehta

#22. I miss the standard of the New York Philharmonic's playing very much. It has certainly been a high point in my life.

Zubin Mehta

#23. I have sat in with the Burbank Philharmonic and the Topanga Orchestra when they need someone if someone gets sick or something.

Torrey DeVitto

#24. The whole reason for Jazz at the Philharmonic was to take it to places where I could break down segregation.

Norman Granz

#25. The New York Philharmonic is a tremendous opportunity, a great orchestra.

Zubin Mehta

#26. There was the best teachers from the Czech Philharmonic, highly dedicated people, some of the best musicians in the world passing on the knowledge about the country, about the principles, and about the music.

Miroslav Vitous

#27. Not with the Rochester Philharmonic, but I formed my own orchestra, made up of musicians from the Eastman School, where I'm on the faculty now, direct the Jazz Ensemble and teach improvisation classes.

Chuck Mangione

#28. And to understand this, I think this is a most important point where I would like always to be understood what we do with the New York Philharmonic. That the meaning of the music is number one.

Kurt Masur

#29. From time to time, the Vienna Philharmonic could play without a conductor because they are so good.

Bernard Arnault

#30. You pay a whore to make you feel like a man, you fund a philharmonic to make yourself feel like a refined man.

Sam Lipsyte

#31. As I came to New York, it was for me a new beginning. To discover what people are living here. What do they need, what do they expect, what would they like to be the image and the performance of the New York Philharmonic?

Kurt Masur