Piano Playing Quotes

“It so happened that Lucy, who found daily life rather chaotic, entered a more solid world when she opened the piano. She was then no longer either differential or patronizing; no longer either a rebel or a slave. The kingdom of music is not the kingdom of this world; it will accept those whom breeding and intellect and culture have alike rejected. The commonplace person begins to play, and shoots into the empyrean without effort, whilst we look up, marveling how he has escaped us, and thinking how we could worship him and love him, would he but translate his visions into human words, and his experiences into human actions. Perhaps he cannot; certainly he does not, or does so very seldom. Lucy had done so never. . . .

She was no dazzling executante; her runs were not at all like strings of pearls, and she struck no more right notes than was suitable for one of her age and situation. Nor was she the passionate young lady, who performs so tragically on a summer's evening with the window open . . . And she was tragical only in the sense that she was great, for she loved to play on the side of Victory. Victory of what and over what - that is more than the words of daily life can tell us. But that some sonatas of Beethoven are written tragic no one can gainsay; yet they can triumph or despair as the player decides, and Lucy decided that they should triumph.”
― E.M. Forster, A Room with a View

“The mortal sin with Schubert is trying to play him perfectly. It makes no sense, none at all. You have to do the opposite, you have to--how shall I put it--it's more like you have to play him clumsily, a little tipsily, or better yet, drunkenly, helplessly, shakily, almost ignorantly, with an understanding, an inkling at least of an era in which people, even if they did cut loose and dance, still felt shame, still blushed. With Schubert there's a lot of keeping silent. Everything is directed inward. I knew enough people who got quieter and quieter when they drank; Schubert did it when he composed. This was someone who had no idea who he was, or at least he didn't know that he was endowed with great genius. I don't want to hear about immortality. You have to have it in your heart, and in your wrist.
...
Often, when I wake up, in the morning or in the afternoon after a little nap, and then especially, I have the feeling of having been dead, a strong, not even unpleasant feeling. That's how you should play Schubert.

[Suvorin]”
― Wolf Wondratschek, Self-Portrait with Russian Piano