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A musicologist is a man who can read music but can't hear it.

— Thomas Beecham

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Source and credibility

Wikiquote does not flag this quote as disputed or misattributed.

Source: Quoted by H. Proctor-Gregg, Beecham Remembered (1976), p. 154
Source quality: Secondhand citation Quoted from another book or article rather than from the original.

More by Thomas Beecham

I found it as alluring as a wayward woman and determined to tame it.

Conductors by John L. Holmes (1988)

The grand tune is the only thing in music that the great public really understands.

Conductors by John L. Holmes (1988)

If I cannot sing a work, I cannot conduct it.

Conductors by John L. Holmes (1988)

Asked if he had ever conducted any Stockhausen, he said, "No, but I once trod in some."

No composer has written as much as 100 bars of worthwhile music since 1925.

Conductors by John L. Holmes (1988)

The musical equivalent of the towers of St Pancras Station

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Topics

Music

More quotes by Thomas Beecham

Composers should write tunes the chauffeurs and errand boys can whistle.

Too much counterpoint; what is worse, Protestant counterpoint.

Great music is that which penetrates the ear with facility and leaves the memory with difficulty. Magical music never leaves the memory.

The function of music is to release us from the tyranny of conscious thought.

What can you do with it? It's like a lot of yaks jumping about."

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The emphasis of study upon a particular aspect of music is in itself ideological because it contains implications about the music's value.

Lucy Green

Music is well said to be the speech of angels.

Thomas Carlyle Critical and Miscellaneous Essays (1827)

Music has no subject beyond the combinations of notes we hear, for music speaks not only by means of sounds, it speaks nothing but sound.

Eduard Hanslick

Above the pitch, out of tune, and off the hinges.

François Rabelais Gargantua and Pantagruel (1532)

Attribution

Quote text and notes from Wikiquote: Thomas Beecham (page history), available under CC BY-SA 4.0. Source quality and labels are our own summary of what Wikiquote records.