Yehudi Menuhin

“Music is a therapy. It is a communication far more powerful than words, far more immediate, far more emotional.”

“Peace may sound simple - one beautiful word - but it requires everything we have, every quality, every strength, every discipline.”

“The violinist is that peculiarly human phenomenon distilled to a rare potency - half tiger, half poet.”

“We are all citizens of the world. We are all of one blood.”

“I can only think of music as something inherent in every human being - a birthright.”

“The bow is the soul of the violin.”

“Each human being has the eternal duty of turning what is hard and brutal into pleasure and usefulness, praise and joy.”

“Music creates order out of chaos: for rhythm imposes unanimity upon the divergent, melody imposes continuity upon the disjointed, and harmony imposes compatibility upon the incongruous.”

“The principal task of a conductor is not to put himself in evidence but to disappear behind his functions as much as possible.”

“I have always looked upon decay as being just as wonderful and rich an expression of life as growth.”

“To be a musician is a great privilege, but it is also a great responsibility.”

“A musician's whole life is to listen.”

“The teacher is the one who gets the most out of the lessons, and the true teacher is the learner.”

“Improvisation is not the expression of accident but rather of the accumulated yearnings, dreams, and wisdom of our very soul.”

“Real understanding does not come from what we learn in books; it comes from what we learn from love of nature, of music, of man.”

“If I don't practice for a day, I know it. If I don't practice for two days, the critics know it. If I don't practice for three days, the public knows it.”

“The purpose of art is to console and to entertain.”