To the average mind popular music would mean compositions vulgarly conceived and commonplace in their treatment. That is absolutely false.

I think that the quality of all bands is steadily improving and it is a pleasant thought to me that perhaps the efforts of Sousa's Band have quickened that interest and improved that quality.

America can well expect to develop a goodly amount of composers for she has a goodly number of people.

Any composer who is gloriously conscious that he is a composer must believe that he receives his inspiration from a source higher than himself.

From childhood I was passionately fond of music and wanted to be a musician. I have no recollection of any real desire ever to be anything else.

Is it not the business of the conductor to convey to the public in its dramatic form the central idea of a composition; and how can he convey that idea successfully if he does not enter heart and soul into the life of the music and the tale it unfolds?

I still feel the impulse to give young writers a hearing, and I believe I have played more unpublished compositions than any other band leader in the country.

Anybody can write music of a sort. But touching the public heart is quite another thing.

There is one thing that freezes a musician more than the deadliest physical cold, and that is the spiritual chill of an unresponsive audience!

I am happy now, to recall that I was no only his son but his companion, and whenever there was a hunting expedition or any other pleasure, I was always with him.

Remember always that the composer's pen is still mightier than the bow of the violinist; in you lie all the possibilities of the creation of beauty.

Sincere composers believe in God.

My religion lies in my composition.

The average music-lover hears only the production under prevailing conditions.

Grand opera is the most powerful of stage appeals and that almost entirely through the beauty of music.

The movements which I make I cannot possibly repress because, at the time, I am actually the idea I am interpreting, and naturally I picture my players and auditors as in accord with me. I know, of course, that my mannerisms have been widely discussed.

I had found English audiences highly satisfactory. They are the best listeners in the world. Perhaps the music-lovers of some of our larger cities equal the English, but I do not believe they can be surpassed in that respect.

I firmly believe that we have more latent musical talent in America than there is in any other country. But to dig it out there must be good music throughout the land, a lot of it. Everyone must hear it, and such a process takes time.

I have always believed that 98% of a student's progress is due to his own efforts, and 2% to his teacher.

No nation as young as America can be expected to become immediately a power in the arts.

I can almost always write music; at any hour of the twenty-four, if I put pencil to paper, music comes.

My success is not due to any personal superiority over other people.

Jazz will endure just as long people hear it through their feet instead of their brains.

The office of President is a great one; to every true American it seems the greatest on earth. And to me, as I was engaged in weaving a background of music for the pageantry of it, there came a deeper realization of the effect of that office on the man.

There is much modern music that is better adapted to a wind combination than to a string, although for obvious reasons originally scored for an orchestra. If in such cases the interpretation is equal to the composition the balance of a wind combination is more satisfying.

American teachers have one indisputable advantage over foreign ones; they understand the American temperament and can judge its unevenness, its lights and its shadows.

To the average mind popular music would mean compositions vulgarly conceived and commonplace in their treatment. That is absolutely false.

Composers are the only people who can hear good music above bad sounds.

Governmental aid is a drawback rather than an assistance, as, although it may facilitate in the routine of artistic production, it is an impediment to the development of true artistic genius.

I am happy now, to recall that I was not only his son but his companion, and whenever there was a hunting expedition or any other pleasure, I was always with him.

Remember always that the composers pen is still mightier than the bow of the violinist in you lie all the possibilities of the creation of beauty.

Cancer can take away all of my physical abilities. It cannot touch my mind, it cannot touch my heart, and it cannot touch my soul.

A man must be strong in that profession, he must have vigor of body and mind, yet I am all out of breath if I walk up a hill; I have not the heart to crush even a fly.

There are those, I know, who will reply that the liberation of humanity, the freedom of man and mind, is nothing but a dream. They are right. It is. It is the American Dream.

The experience of life consists of the experience which the spirit has of itself in matter and as matter, in mind and as mind, in emotion, as emotion, etc.

Singularity shows something wrong in the mind.

Remember above all that mental stability comes by examining the contents of the mind, not by avoidence.

I think we will have a boy baby and he will be born on the 20th of August. Everyone else has a girl baby and at times I don't believe I should mind having a little Phyllis Dawn but Dearest wants a boy and I do.

Do not dwell in the past, do not dream of the future, concentrate the mind on the present moment.

But if anyone supposes that there was no commercial fraud in the Middle Ages, let him study the commercial legislation of England for that period, and his mind will be satisfied, if he has a mind to be satisfied and not only a fancy to run away with him.

The mind moves in the direction of our currently dominant thoughts.

I love the male body, it's better designed than the male mind.

Disney had such a hold on the mind of America-they were Adolf Hitler. The whole country thought Disney was some sort of god and that animation was some sort of pure thing for children.

One of the most difficult things to contend with in a hospital is that assumption on the part of the staff that because you have lost your gall bladder you have also lost your mind.

I did know that the book would end with a mind-boggling trial, but I didn't know exactly how it would turn out. I like a little suspense when I am writing, too.

Many ideas grow better when transplanted into another mind than in the one where they sprung up.

With a firm and steadfast mind one should hold under all conditions, that everywhere the earth is below and the sky above, and to the energetic man, every region is his fatherland.

Periods of wholesome laziness, after days of energetic effort, will wonderfully tone up the mind and body.

Keep your blood clean, your body lean, and your mind sharp.