Quotes from Joshua Bell

Obviously, I want it to be legally downloaded, and I myself have spent a fortune on iTunes because, for me, that's the easiest way to get music.

Although I hardly ever turn on the TV set unless it's football season, I do watch a lot of TV on my iPad - perfect for long airplane journeys.

I kind of alternate between conducting and playing and kind of juggling those things, but I don't use a baton.

My father was - actually was an Episcopal priest as a young man. Became a psychotherapist, a psychologist. My mother is Jewish, so I grew up in a mixed background. But the common denominator was certainly music, and that was sort of emphasized in my household as music being sort of the spiritual force.

For some reason I can't explain, artist and musicians tend to look younger than our age. Being in music, you need this youthful sense of discovery and wonder for what you're doing and keep your imagination open. That's a youthful way of looking at life and I think that reflects in how you age.

If I read every comment on my YouTube videos, I'd go crazy with people that are saying negative things.

I hate YouTube sometimes because people put up things of mine that were never meant for consumption and also because of some of the comments people write about my videos.

Kids need to be structured in some way, but you don't want to force something down their throats that they have no interest in.

Actors want to do Shakespeare again and again, or want to do Hamlet. When you hear one guy do Hamlet and another guy do it, it's going to be a whole different experience.

It's very hard to find a pianist that's willing to play the so-called accompanist role on part of the program and yet be capable of being a great solo pianist that you would want for the big sonatas.

I'm not a businessman, so I don't know how to solve the problems of the recording industry.

What drew me to the violin was mastering the instrument technically, which I'm continuing to do. You want to push boundaries, to not always be in your comfort zone. If you don't, you get stale. So you have to find areas of growth.

I think it's really important to always kind of stretch your boundaries and your limits and get out of your comfort zone. And for me, that's very important.

I've been touring for 25 years. I'm used to it, so I love it. Although I feel the tug of home, as I have three little kids, I don't suffer like some artists who constantly complain about how much they hate traveling.

I like working with kids because I enjoy seeing the looks on their faces and, it's kind of selfish, I want a future audience.

We like to categorize things into showy things and deep things, you know, and things that are high music - important music - and shallow music. And I think that's dangerous, because there's often a mix of both.

Stradivarius, in particular, was the most amazing craftsman and one of the great artists and scientists that ever lived because he figured out something with the sound and the science of acoustics that we still don't understand it completely.

People wrote the most beautiful things during the ugliest times.

Music plays a huge role in the movie. The music in Star Wars, I can't imagine what the movie would have been like without it. It made the film.

The man on the street, he knows who Beethoven is, he knows who Mozart is.

I'm having a blast being the music director at the Academy of St. Martin in the Fields. It certainly is challenging for me, but I love challenges.

Over the years, I've collected a lot of musical friends.

There was a time, early on in my career, when it was very important for me to be liked by everyone. It meant that I was musically less honest with myself.

I know how to deal with jet lag, and I know just how much rest I need and when I need to take naps. When you walk on stage, you need your brain working at its highest and most fully-functioning, so it's not always easy, but I sort of figure it out.