Quotes from Glenn Gould

Beethoven's reputation is based entirely on gossip. The middle Beethoven represents a supreme example of a composer on an ego trip.

It's true that I've driven through a number of red lights on occasion, but on the other hand, I've stopped at a lot of green ones but never gotten credit for it.

The justification of art is the internal combustion it ignites in the hearts of men and not its shallow, externalized, public manifestations.

I love the early sonatas; I love the early Mozart, period. I'm really fond of that moment when he was either emulating Haydn or Carl Philipp Emanuel Bach or anybody but himself. The moment he found himself, as conventional wisdom would have it, at the age of 18 or 19 or 20, I stop being so interested in him.

The justification of art is the internal combustion it ignites in the hearts of men and not its shallow, externalized, public manifestations. The purpose of art is not the release of a momentary ejection of adrenaline but is, rather, the gradual, lifelong construction of a state of wonder and serenity.

The purpose of art is not the release of a momentary ejection of adrenaline but rather the gradual, lifelong construction of a state of wonder and serenity.

If an artist wants to use his mind for creative work, cutting oneself off from society is a necessary thing

My moods are inversely related to the clarity of the sky.

I believe that the justification of art is the internal combustion it ignites in the hearts of men and not its shallow, externalized, public manifestations. The purpose of art is not the release of a momentary ejection of adrenaline but is, rather, the gradual, lifelong construction of a state of wonder and serenity.

I detest audiences - not in their individual components, but en masse I detest audiences. I think they're a force of evil. It seems to me rule of mob law.

I've always had a sort of intuition that for every hour you spend with other human beings you need x number of hours alone. Now, what that x represents I don't really know, whether it be two and seven-eights or seven and two-eights, but it's a substantial ratio.

I always assumed everybody shared my love for overcast skies. It came as a shock to find out that some people prefer sunshine.

In the best of all possible worlds, art would be unnecessary. Its offer of restorative, placative therapy would go begging a patient. The professional specialization involved in its making would be presumption. The generalities of its applicability would be an affront. The audience would be the artist and their life would be art.

I don't approve of people who watch television, but I am one of them.

This solitude that you can acquire and should cultivate, this opportunity for contemplation of which you should take advantage, will be useful to you only insofar as you can substitute for those questions posed by the student for the teacher, questions posed by yourself for yourself. - Advice to a Graduation

The moment that boredom, or fatigue, the ennui of the passing years, overcomes the specific integrity with which you apply yourself to every problem, then you will be menaced by that over-reliance upon the susceptible positive attributes of system. - Advice to a Graduation

I'm fascinated with what happens to the creative output when you isolate yourself from the approval and disapproval of the people around you.

The purpose of art is not the release of a momentary ejection of adrenaline but rather the gradual, lifelong construction of a state of wonder and serenity.

The purpose of art is the lifelong construction of a state of wonder.

If an artist wants to use his mind for creative work, cutting oneself off from society is a necessary thing

The nature of the contrapuntal experience is that every note has to have a past and a future on the horizontal plane.