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Gabriel Fauré
14 quotes
“Now, there are some periods of music, some pitches of which I can hear nothing... of my music as well as of others. I feel that there is on my shoulders nothing more than a terrible cloak of misery and discouragement.”
Gabriel Fauré (1845–1924) first seen 1903 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Private letter, dated August 1903, discussing Fauré's encroaching deafness; as quoted in At the Piano with Gabriel Fauré (1963) by Marguerite Long, p. 26
“Gabriel Fauré, repeating a thought he had often expressed to me, wrote in a letter on the 2nd August 1910: "In piano music one cannot use padding; one must pay in cash so that it is interesting all the time. It is perhaps the most difficult genre if you want to be as satisfying as possible," and he added modestly, "and I do my best." Then, as if in reply to some unjust reproach, "Only it cannot be done any faster.”
Gabriel Fauré (1845–1924) said by 1924 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: As quoted in At the Piano with Gabriel Fauré (1963) by Marguerite Long, p. 75
“But Lortat, I'm not in the habit of attracting crowds.”
Gabriel Fauré (1845–1924) first seen 1914 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Consoling a disappointed Robert Lortat in June 1914 after the pianist had given a sparsely attended recital of Fauré's work, as quoted in Gabriel Fauré: A Musical Life (2005) by Jean-Michel Nectoux and Roger Nichols, pp…
“As to the piece I have started, it will only be the fiftieth or more of my piano pieces that, with rare exceptions, pianists allow to pile up without playing, That has been their lot for twenty years.”
Gabriel Fauré (1845–1924) first seen 1913 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Private letter, summer 1913, regarding the Tenth Barcarolle; as quoted in At the Piano with Gabriel Fauré (1963) by Marguerite Long, p. 78
“As for my work, I can say that it reaches its end. [...] I do not want my Quartet to be published and played before it has been tried out in front of my friends, who have always been the first to hear my works: Dukas, Poujaud, Lalo, de Lallemand. I trust their judgment and it is to them that I leave the decision of whether this Quartet should be published or destroyed.”
Gabriel Fauré (1845–1924) first seen 1924 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Private letter—circa September 1924—regarding his just completed string quartet; as quoted in At the Piano with Gabriel Fauré (1963) by Marguerite Long, p. 109
“When I am no more, you will hear said of my work: "After all, it is only so much..." You will detach yourself from it, perhaps ... All that has no importance. I have done what I could ... and so, judge, my God.”
Gabriel Fauré (1845–1924) first seen 1924 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Last words spoken by Fauré (November 3, 1924), as quoted in At the Piano with Gabriel Fauré (1963) by Marguerite Long, p. 28
“To know an art really well, one must know everything about it, both its origins and its development.”
Gabriel Fauré (1845–1924) said by 1924 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: As quoted in At the Piano with Gabriel Fauré (1963) by Marguerite Long, p. 25
“How many times have I asked myself what use music is? And what am I translating? What feelings? What ideas? How can I express something I do not understand myself?”
Gabriel Fauré (1845–1924) said by 1924 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Private letter, as quoted in At the Piano with Gabriel Fauré (1963) by Marguerite Long, p. 25
“He denied the presence of inspiration: "Without work, which is art, there is nothing," he said. "Say only that which is of value, or stay silent" was the credo of his entire existence.”
Gabriel Fauré (1845–1924) said by 1924 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: As paraphrased and quoted in At the Piano with Gabriel Fauré (1963) by Marguerite Long, p. 27
“And I always enjoy seeing sunlight play on the rocks, the water, the trees and plains. What variety of effects, what brilliance and what softness... I wish my music could show as much diversity.”
Gabriel Fauré (1845–1924) said by 1924 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Private letter, as quoted in At the Piano with Gabriel Fauré (1963) by Marguerite Long, p. 67
“Imagining is trying to formulate all one would wish to be better, all that surpasses reality.”
Gabriel Fauré (1845–1924) said by 1924 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: As quoted in At the Piano with Gabriel Fauré (1963) by Marguerite Long, p. 79
“For me art and music especially consists of raising ourselves as high as possible above that which is.”
Gabriel Fauré (1845–1924) said by 1924 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: As quoted in At the Piano with Gabriel Fauré (1963) by Marguerite Long, p. 110
“It has been said that my Requiem does not express the fear of death and someone has called it a lullaby of death. But it is thus that I see death: as a happy deliverance, an aspiration towards happiness above, rather than as a painful experience. The music of Gounod has been criticized for its over-inclination towards human tenderness. But his nature predisposed him to feel this way: religious emotion took this form inside him. Is it not necessary to accept the artist’s nature? As to my Requiem, perhaps I have also instinctively sought to escape from what is thought right and proper, after all the years of accompanying burial services on the organ! I know it all by heart. I wanted to write something different.”
Gabriel Fauré (1845–1924) first seen 1902 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Interviewed by Louis Aguettant on July 12, 1902; excerpt published in Comoedia (March 3, 1954); English translation published in Gabriel Fauré (1979) by Robert Orledge; reproduced in "A Hundred Voices Singing Requiem" b…
“It was not just in the Andante of the Second Quartet that I remembered having translated (almost involuntarily) the distant memory of bells which in the evening at Montgauzy — and this is some time ago — came to us from a village called Cadillac when the wind blew from the west. From this dull sound a vague dreaminess arose, which, like all vague dreams, is literally untranslatable. Only, does it not happen often that some exterior fact numbs us so that our thoughts become so imprecise that in reality they are not thoughts, and yet are nevertheless something in which we can take pleasure? The desire for things which do not exist perhaps, and this is indeed where music holds sway.”
Gabriel Fauré (1845–1924) said by 1924 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Discussing Piano Quartet No. 2, in correspondence with Jacques Thibaud, 2006; as quoted in At the Piano with Gabriel Fauré (1963) by Marguerite Long, p. 107