Coleman:
Composing is a way of keeping up with not repeating - making me aware of how much I'm repeating and not repeating - what I'm not repeating is better.
Sound as a way of expressing an emotion, especially coming from another human being, like talking.
Sound is sound. Sound is vibration. Although sound is one thing, music is another, emotion is another. Feeling is even more complex.
Music is an idea and everybody has an idea, including your kids.
I play music every day, but music cannot touch the things we are saying to each other. I could play my heart out and have you crying, but it's never going to be as close to you.
The sound is made from the instrument. The ideas are made from your brain. The ideas and sound actually meet. They don't necessarily meet to make love. Sometimes they're meeting to make war
Each idea you play tells you how to play a better idea.
I prefer the idea of sound to the idea of style.
Music to make people happy.
Smith:
How to shape differences is our task as composers. The sound material is stored (remembered) as differences. Differences create all languages. No differences—no languages. No language—no consciousness. No consciousness—no humans being human. The job of the composer is to facilitate the continuation of the uniqueness of the human entity.
Society has to leave each one room to be brave. A society that encourages essential individual bravery will never die, will never be poor, will never make wars, will never be short in vision. This is the society I work for in music.
For the moment I will substitute these quotations for original thought!
