Johann Sebastian Bach

"The preservation of tradition is not opposition to progress, but its foundation."

"Every phrase must breathe as a living being breathes."

"The world suffers from too many notes, not too few."

"I have learned more from failure than from success ever could teach me."

"The hands that create beauty in sound must also create beauty in conduct."

"In each variation lies the possibility of discovering something previously hidden."

"I trust that what appears as suffering today will be understood as mercy tomorrow."

"The organization of sound is the organization of thought made manifest."

"To live a day without creating something is a day stolen from one's own soul."

"Greatness in art is achieved not by breaking all rules, but by understanding why they exist."

"I have written my requiem not in fear, but in confidence."

"The quest for beauty drives all meaningful human endeavor."

"Music that does not lift the spirit is merely noise with pretense."

"I am convinced that nothing great is accomplished without a firm grounding in discipline."

"The present age underestimates the wisdom contained in ancient forms."

"To compose is to participate in creation itself, though on an infinitely smaller scale."

"I have found that limitation breeds invention more surely than freedom ever could."

"The heart speaks most truthfully when the conscious mind is silent."

"What is technique but the marriage of intention and discipline?"

"I entrust my legacy not to the critics, but to those who love music as I do."

"The complexity of a piece should never exceed the clarity of its emotion."

"In solitude, surrounded by silence, the composer hears all the music that ever was."

"I have come to understand that fear is often the disguise that hope wears."

"The musician who does not pray to his instrument will never truly play it."

"My contemporaries pursue novelty; I pursue truth."

"The greatest compositions solve problems through beauty rather than intellectual gymnastics."

"I have learned that the surest path to immortality is the daily practice of mortality."

"To serve only myself would be to serve no one worth serving."

"The voice of tradition, when truly heard, is the voice of liberation."

"I compose with the knowledge that all will eventually fall silent."