The artist alone sees spirits. But after he has told of their appearing to him, everybody sees them.
Johann Wolfgang von Goethe (1749-1832) 

The whole problem can be stated quite simply by asking, "Is there a meaning to music?" My answer would be, "Yes." And "Can you state in so many words what the meaning is?" My answer to that would be, "No."
Aaron Copland 

There are some experiences in life which should not be demanded twice from any man, and one of them is listening to the Brahms Requiem.
George Bernard Shaw (1856-1950) 

There is nothing more notable in Socrates than that he found time, when he was an old man, to learn music and dancing, and thought it time well spent.
Michel de Montaigne 

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.
Johann Sebastian Bach 

Too many pieces of music finish too long after the end.
Igor Stravinsky (1882-1971) 

We don't like their sound, and guitar music is on the way out.
Decca Recording Company, rejecting the Beatles, 1962

Well, art is art, isn't it? Still, on the other hand, water is water! And east is east and west is west and if you take cranberries and stew them like applesauce they taste much more like prunes than rhubarb does. Now, uh... Now you tell me what you know.
Groucho Marx (1895-1977) 

When Michelangelo finished the painting of the Sistine Chapel's ceiling, he spent the rest of his life trying to remove the paint that had poured into his sleeve.
Francois Cavanna