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 believe that architecture is fundamentally a public space where people can gather and communicate, think about the history, think about the lives of human beings, or the world.
What i like about photographs is that they capture a moment thatβs gone forever, impossible to reproduce.
If we look at the works of JS Bach ... on each page we discover things which we thought were born only yesterday, from delightful arabesques to an overflowing of religious feeling greater than anything we have since discovered.
I usually write for the individual reader -though I would like to have many such readers. There are some poets who write for people assembled in big rooms, so they can live through something collectively. I prefer my reader to take my poem and have a one-on-one relationship with it.
The beauty of jazz is that it can accommodate all styles. You can take jazz and put rock in it, and it's still jazz.
It's a two-dimensional gig being a singer, and you can get lost in your own tedium and repetition.
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