“A symphony must be like the world. It must contain everything.”

“I don’t let myself get carried away by my own ideas – I abandon 19 out of 20 of them every day.”

“Fortunately, something always remains to be harvested. So let us not be idle.”

“I am hitting my head against the walls, but the walls are giving way.”

“Discipline, work. Work, discipline.”

“If you think you’re boring your audience, go slower not faster.”

“The real art of conducting consists in transitions.”

“It’s not just a question of conquering a summit previously unknown, but of tracing, step by step, a new pathway to it.”

“I embark on this enterprise rather like a soldier who shoots arrows into the dark at an invisible target.”

“The degree to which the word sustains the sound can be measured when you pass from wordless music to text.”

“The call of love sounds very hollow among these immobile rocks.”

“The pointer of a pair of scales always returns to the center.”