A Quote by Yo-Yo Ma

When people ask me how they should approach performance, I always tell them the professional musician should aspire to the state of the beginner. — © Yo-Yo Ma
When people ask me how they should approach performance, I always tell them the professional musician should aspire to the state of the beginner.
I do speak to kids a lot. I am very clear with them that not all of them should aspire to be me and not all of them should be aspire to be LeBron.
When people ask me to name the Ligonier teaching material they should use to help them grow; I tell them, 'You should start with The Holiness of God.'
If people ask me, I always tell them: "Quite well, thank you, I'm very glad to say." If people ask me, I always answer, "Quite well, thank you, how are you today?" I always answer, I always tell them, If they ask me Politely... BUT SOMETIMES I wish That they wouldn't
The beginner should approach style warily, realizing that it is himself he is approaching, no other; and he should begin by turning resolutely away from all devices that are popularly believed to indicate style - all mannerisms, tricks, adornments. The approach to style is by way of plainness, simplicity, orderliness, sincerity.
We are a high-performance environment and guys being professional about how they prepare for games is not something that should be frowned upon. It should be expected of players.
Bowie is a musician, but he works like a painter. Thom always thought that we should aspire to that.
Congress and state legislatures should not tell teachers how to teach, any more than they should tell surgeons how to perform operations.
I started thinking, my gosh, all this sophisticated software for measuring how Yo-Yo plays, and how he moves and this technique of the bow, I should be able to use similar techniques for measuring the way anybody moves, and so somebody who is not a professional or a trained musician, I should be able to make a musical environment for them.
Most people you'd tell "I'm gonna be a musician," they'd say, "you're crazy, you're gonna starve, you're gonna be poor, a drug addict, go to jail, you'll never make it, there's too much competition, it's a terrible business," etc. But my chorus teacher in high school said, "you've got what it takes to be a really good professional musician, you should consider it." That was an epiphany for me. So I thought, well, maybe I can help somebody, too.
People always ask me where they should go to work, and I always tell them to go to work for whom they admire the most.
Promise me this, that you'll stand by me forever. But if God forbid Fate should step in and force us into a goodbye. If you have children someday, when they point to the pictures please tell them my name. Tell them how the crowd went wild, tell them how I hope they shine.
I'm not one who learned the Koran through recitation as a child, but one thing that always stands out is that there's no compulsion in religion. You can't tell people how to believe. It is an individual's relationship with their creator, and human beings should not be in the business of trying to tell others how they should live their lives.
If a subject has a delicate surface to it, you do not want to go charging in there. You need to establish some kind of presence and understanding. I will say, Try to forget I'm here. I won't ask you to pose, I won't ask you to do anything. It's important that I just be allowed to be around, to be present. Photographing people requires a willingness to be rejected. So, I think the best approach is to be honest and direct. Very often, I tell them, You don't know me. There's no reason why you should trust me... the only thing I can promise is that I'll try to do the most honest work I can.
In the performance of our duty one feeling should direct us; the case we should consider as our own, and we should ask ourselves, whether, placed under similar circumstances, we should choose to submit to the pain and danger we are about to inflict.
I get irritated when people counsel me on what I should do with my life, or tell me I should get married, or tell me what I should do. I think people have their role models for happiness and it helps if others fit into that.
I always tell my students when you're going to be a jazz musician the first thing you've got to do is be a professional musician, and that means you have to feed yourself with the instrument.
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