Words matter. These are the best Mstislav Rostropovich Quotes, and they’re great for sharing with your friends.
My mother carried me for 10 months. I asked her ‘Mother, you had an extra month, why you didn’t make me a beautiful face?’ and mother told me, ‘My son, I was busy making your beautiful hands and heart.’
Explain to me, please, why in our literature and art so often people absolutely incompetent in this field have the final word.
Of course, I know everything that happens in Russia. But even at the most dangerous moment or the most negative moment now, it’s still 10 times better than what it was in the communist state.
I never studied, but I had the best teachers.
I like coming to the United States because the United States played an important role in my life.
I listened to Pablo Casals, which was a big change for me. Without hearing Casals, I would never have advanced as I did.
People are craving this great progress in electronics, going after computers, the Internet, etc. It’s a giant progress technologically. But they must have a balance of soul, a balance for human beauty. That means art has an important role.
All my life I wanted to play music with love to every member of the audience.
It is my aim, my destination in life to make the cello as beloved an instrument as the violin and piano.
The war years were the most difficult time of my life. There was real famine in Moscow. The water froze inside the houses. There was no heat.
I played with the best conductors of the world.
Music is part of history, and our history has lessons that cannot be separated from our greatest music.
When I started learning the cello, I fell in love with the instrument because it seemed like a voice – my voice.
I have a very deep religious belief.
Every man must have the right fearlessly to think independently and express his opinion about what he knows, what he has personally thought about and experienced, and not merely to express with slightly different variations the opinion which has been inculcated in him.
If I make a speech, I need a translator. But music does not need a translation. People understand me through the sound. That I think is very important. This is just one planet, like one family.
I know that after my letter there will be undoubtedly an ‘opinion’ about me, but I am not afraid of it. I openly say what I think. Talent, of which we are proud, must not be submitted to the assaults of the past.
