The Best Leonard Bernstein quotes

When I am with composers, I say I am a conductor. When I am with conductors, I say I am a composer. — Leonard Bernstein

To be a success as a Broadway composer, you must be Jewish or gay. I’m both. — Leonard Bernstein

If you’re a good composer, you steal good steals. — Leonard Bernstein

It is hard to think of another composer who so perfectly marries form and passion. — Leonard Bernstein

Any asshole can write a tone–row. It takes a composer to write a tune. — Leonard Bernstein

I’m not interested in having an orchestra sound like itself. I want it to sound like the composer. — Leonard Bernstein

This will be our reply to violence: to make music more intensely, more beautifully, more devotedly than ever before. — Leonard Bernstein

The joy of music should never be interrupted by a commercial. — Leonard Bernstein

Music can name the unnameable and communicate the unknowable. — Leonard Bernstein

Mozart’s music is constantly escaping from its frame, because it cannot be contained in it. — Leonard Bernstein

Einstein said that ‘the most beautiful experience we can have is the mysterious.’ So why do so many of us try to explain the beauty of music, thus depriving it of its mystery? — Leonard Bernstein

Music, because of its specific and far–reaching metaphorical powers, can name the unnamable and communicate the unknowable. — Leonard Bernstein

Music, of all the arts, stands in a special region, unlit by any star but its own, and utterly without meaning … except its own. — Leonard Bernstein

Even experimental composers, revolutionary composers, self–styled radicals are, in writing revolutionary music, recognizing the music that preceded them precisely by trying to avoid it. — Leonard Bernstein

Elvis is the greatest cultural force in the twentieth century. He introduced the beat to everything, music, language, clothes, it’s a whole new social revolution–the 60’s comes from it. — Leonard Bernstein

I can’t live one day without hearing music, playing it , studying it , or thinking about it . — Leonard Bernstein

I hate you, Richard Wagner . . . but I hate you on my knees. — Leonard Bernstein

To achieve great things, two things are needed: a plan and not quite enough time. — Leonard Bernstein

Two things are necessary for great achievement: a plan and not quite enough time. — Leonard Bernstein

Inspiration is wonderful when it happens, but the writer must develop an approach for the rest of the time… The wait is simply too long. — Leonard Bernstein

Conducting is like making love to a hundred people at the same time. — Leonard Bernstein

Life without music is meaningless, music without life is academic. — Leonard Bernstein

Life without music is unthinkable. Life without music is academic. That is why my contact with music is a total embrace. — Leonard Bernstein

I’m no longer quite sure what the question is, but I do know that the answer is Yes. — Leonard Bernstein

The second fiddle. I can get plenty of first violinists, but to find someone who can play the second fiddle with enthusiasm — Leonard Bernstein

Life without music is unthinkable. — Leonard Bernstein

Children must receive music instruction as naturally as food, with as much pleasure as they derive from a ball game, and this must happen from the beginning of their lives. — Leonard Bernstein

Success is all very well as long as you don’t inhale. — Leonard Bernstein