Aaron Copland: Composer

Aaron Copland was American composer, composition teacher, writer, and conductor. Explore interesting quotes on composer.

Aaron Copland: 26 quotes2 likes

“The composer who is frightened of losing his artistic integrity through contact with a mass audience is no longer aware of the meaning of the word art.”

Aaron Copland and His World, ISBN 9780691124704.

“I don't compose. I assemble materials.”

Aaron Copland: the Life and Work of an Uncommon Man, ISBN 0805049096.

“Nadia Boulanger was quite aware that as a composition teacher she labored under two further disadvantages: she was not herself a regularly practicing composer and in so far as she composed at all she must of necessity be listed in that unenviable category of the woman composer. Everyone knows that the high achievement of women musicians as vocalists and instrumentalists has no counterpart in the field of musical composition. This historically poor showing has puzzled more than one observer. … Is it possible that there is a mysterious element in the nature of musical creativity that runs counter to the nature of the feminine mind? … The future may very well have a different tale to tell; for the present, however, no woman's name will be found on the list of world-famous composers.”

Copland on Music (1960) ISBN 0393001989.

“I object to background music no matter how good it is. Composers want people to listen to their music, they don't want them doing something else while their music is on. I'd like to get the guy who sold all those big businessmen the idea of putting music in the elevators, for he was really clever. What on earth good does it do anybody to hear those four or eight bars while going up a few flights.”

Quoted in Classic Essays on Twentieth-Century Music, ISBN 0028645812.