Explore popular quotes and sayings by an English composer Richard Rodney Bennett.
Last updated on November 25, 2024.
Sir Richard Rodney Bennett was an English composer of film, TV and concert music, and also a jazz pianist and occasional vocalist. He was based in New York City from 1979 until his death there in 2012.
I realized very early that I was never going to make by living by writing string quartets. But I wanted to write music and I didn't want to have to do anything else.
People ask what was the first piece of music I wrote. There was no first piece.
Elizabeth Lutyens was the first professional composer that I ever knew. I sent someextremely infantile pieces that I I'd written and got marvellous encouragement andinterest from her... she's certainly the English composer who's influenced me themost.
I wanted to write music, and cook, and play cards, and have a nice time.
I am proud to be able to claim that, from the age of nineteen, I've managed to earna living entirely as a composer.
I was a catastrophe at Science and Games, but the good thing about Quaker schools is that they encourage you in those subjects for which you show an aptitude.
I hated teaching composition. I was playing music I didn't particularly want to play, being on committees I didn't want to be on.
When I came across something I liked, I wanted to find out as much as I could about it. This was as true of hearing Hoagy Carmichael for the first time as it was later when I first heard Boulez.
Being on a musical quest was something I always enjoyed.
I just scribbled away and eventually a C-major chord was there. I didn't ever decide I was going to be a composer. It was like being tall. It's what I was. It's what I did.