Don't play the notes. Play the meaning of the notes.
Interpretation
This quote emphasizes the importance of expressing emotions and ideas rather than merely playing notes technically.
Pablo Casals suggests that true musicality comes from understanding and conveying the deeper meaning behind the notes we play, rather than just replicating them accurately. This perspective invites musicians to connect with their audience through emotional expression and interpretation, highlighting the art of music as a profound form of communication.
In practice
In a speech about musical education at a conference, one could use this quote to inspire budding musicians to delve deeper into their art.
Bach is the supreme genius of music... This man, who knows everything and feels everything, cannot write one note, however unimportant it may appear, which is anything but transcendent. He has reached the heart of every noble thought, and has done it in the most perfect way.
In music, in the sea, in a flower, in a leaf, in an act of kindness... I see what people call God in all these things.
The love of one's country is a splendid thing. But why should love stop at the border?
The child must know that he is a miracle, that since the beginning of the world there hasn't been, and until the end of the world there will not be, another child like him.
I am an old man but in many senses a very young man. And this is what I want you to be, young, young all your life.
To the whole world you might be just one person, but to one person you might just be the whole world.
I am married to the theater, and the films are only my mistress.
I am very happy to design haute couture. It's a love story between couture and me.
I put steam on the table by being an actor. That is how I live. The longer I live, the more expensive it becomes. So I do my work. And I can't be immensely picky. How many beautiful scripts come in one's lifetime? I have had more than anybody, practically.
Usually in theater, the visual repeats the verbal. The visual dwindles into decoration. But I think with my eyes. For me, the visual is not an afterthought, not an illustration of the text. If it says the same thing as the words, why look? The visual must be so compelling that a deaf man would sit though the performance fascinated.
I do not deny that I have made drawings and watercolors of an erotic nature. But they are always works of art. Are there no artists who have done erotic pictures?
Music in itself carries a whole set of messages which are very, very rich and complex, and the words either serve to exclude certain ones or point up certain others.
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