Rossini would have been a great composer if his teacher had spanked him enough on the backside.

"Every kind of music is good, except the boring kind."

Give me a laundry-list and I'll set it to music.

"One cannot judge 'Lohengrin' from a first hearing, and I certainly do not intend to hear it a second time."

"Answer them [critics] with silence and indifference. It works better, I assure you, than anger and argument. . . ."