“Not many composers have ideas. Far more of them know how to use strange instruments which do not require ideas.”

—  George Gershwin

Page 386
The Composer in the Machine Age (1933)

Adopted from Wikiquote. Last update Jan. 25, 2023. History

Help us to complete the source, original and additional information

Do you have more details about the quote "Not many composers have ideas. Far more of them know how to use strange instruments which do not require ideas." by George Gershwin?
George Gershwin photo
George Gershwin12
American composer and pianist 1898–1937

Related quotes

Neal Stephenson photo

“They knew many things but had no idea why. And strangely this made them more, rather than less, certain that they were right.”

Neal Stephenson book Anathem

Part 2, Apert
Source: Anathem (2008)

Ward Cunningham photo

“Many people have experience with a program that's gotten out of control. They have an idea. They think they know what they want to do. But when they go to put the idea in, the idea is forgotten by the time they've figured out how to put it in.”

Ward Cunningham (1949) American computer programmer who developed the first wiki

A Conversation with Ward Cunningham (2003), To Plan or Not To Plan

Harrison Birtwistle photo

“Composing's not voluntary, you know. There's no choice, you're not free. You're landed with an idea and you have responsibility to that idea.”

Harrison Birtwistle (1934) British composer

In The Observer, April 14, 1996.

Maimónides photo

“Know that the figures employed by prophets are of two kinds: first, where every word which occurs in the simile represents a certain idea: and secondly, where the simile, as a whole, represents a general idea, but has a great many points which have no reference whatever to that idea: they are simply required to give to the simile its proper form and order, or better to conceal the idea: the simile is therefore continued as far as necessary, according to its literal sense. Consider this well.”

Maimónides book The Guide for the Perplexed

Guide for the Perplexed (c. 1190), Introduction

Joseph Joubert photo

“One must know how to enter the ideas of others and how to leave them. One must know how to leave one's own ideas and how to come back to them.”

Joseph Joubert (1754–1824) French moralist and essayist

Linus Pauling photo

“If you want to have good ideas you must have many ideas. Most of them will be wrong, and what you have to learn is which ones to throw away.”

Linus Pauling (1901–1994) American scientist

As quoted by Francis Crick in his presentation &quot;The Impact of Linus Pauling on Molecular Biology&quot; http://oregonstate.edu/dept/Special_Collections/subpages/ahp/1995symposium/crick.html (1995). <br class="br">1990s

Richard Bach photo

“Do you have any idea how many lives we must have gone through before we even got the first idea that there is more to life than eating, or fighting, or power in the Flock? A thousand lives, Jon, ten thousand!”

Richard Bach book Jonathan Livingston Seagull

Source: Jonathan Livingston Seagull

“We have found that it's a good idea to read as many authors and as many different genres as possible. That way, we can learn more about writing and it gives us ideas to try different things.”

Marcia Jones (writer) (1958) American author

Marcia Thornton Jones Interview https://web.archive.org/web/20121024121117/http://www.scholastic.com/teachers/article/marcia-thornton-jones-interview-transcript (1997)

“Nowadays, all students have access to and indeed most own computers and are comfortable with the software used to compose music. There are probably too many musical options for them now and the trick is to limit the number of musical ideas so as to develop structure and continuity in their work.”

Jon Appleton (1939) American composer

"The Decline of Academic Freedom at Dartmouth College", 20 October 2005.
Letter published in "Appleton Leaves Dartmouth", 2005

Frank Herbert photo

“We sift reality through screens composed of ideas. (And such ideas have their roots in older ideas.) Such idea systems are necessarily limited by language, by the ways we can describe them. That is to say: language cuts the grooves in which our thoughts move. If we seek new validity forms (other laws and other orders) we must step outside language.”

Frank Herbert book The Santaroga Barrier

Source: The Santaroga Barrier (1968), Chapter Ten

Related topics