British - Composer | January 28, 1944 - November 12, 2013
I've written a very long piece of music recently, the 'Veil of the Temple,' which lasts about seven hours. It's really a kind of vigil. It takes place during the night, waiting for the resurrection of Christ.
John Tavener
MusicWaitingNightLongPlaceKind
I don't think Beethoven expresses religious truth. He expresses a human truth.
TruthThinkHumanReligiousHe
The music is something outside myself that's also inside myself... Music and a sense of another presence always went hand in hand. Even when I was three, I would improvise music, and my maternal grandfather would act as an audience and used to applaud. I would imitate things like thunder and rain.
MusicRainMyselfGrandfatherThree
We seem to have lost our contact with the primordial: the idea of - call it divine revelation as opposed to something that's learned by the human intellect - something that, if you lay yourself completely open, and you just open your heart completely, something will actually come into it.
HeartYourselfYouLostWillHuman
'Canticum Sacrum' is wonderfully archaic. What Stravinsky does is extraordinary. It takes you on a journey from Gregorian chant right through to the modernism of Webern - and all in 17 minutes.
JourneyYouRightExtraordinaryDoes
The thing I regret most about my life are those inane photos of me with icons. They used to come down here and dress me up, and I just tolerated it. It's my fault. But I shouldn't have done it. They literally brought down costumes, candles, and icons! It was unbelievable stupidity.
LifeDressStupidityMeRegretDown
Suffering is a kind of ecstasy in a way. Having pain all the time makes me terribly, terribly grateful for every moment I've got.
TimeMomentGratefulPainSuffering
My consultant keeps telling me sudden death could come at any moment.
MomentDeathMeConsultantComeAny
I was having these terrible back pains, and then one day in Switzerland, things got very bad. My wife Maryanna called the hotel doctor, but I don't remember any of this, I was out of it. I had an operation, and I was nearly lost.
DayWifeDoctorHotelRememberBad
I've got great joy from rediscovering Western music. I love Schumann and Chopin, and those amazing symphonies of Bruckner.
LoveMusicGreatJoyAmazingGot
Every time I have a hit, I buy a Rolls.
TimeBuyHitRollsEveryEvery Time
The path I follow is still an Orthodox path. You have to follow a path; otherwise, it becomes a little bit new-age, a bit of this, a bit of that.
PathYouFollowLittleStillBit
Copyright © 2024 QuotesDict John Tavener quotes