The First Thing To Do In Life

The Cello Is Like A Beautiful Woman Who Has Not Grown Older, But Younger With Time, More Slender, More Supple, More Graceful.

For The Past Eighty Years I Have Started Each Day In The Same Manner. It Is Not A Mechanical Routine, But Something Essential To My Daily Life. I Go To The Piano, And Play Two Preludes And Fugues Of Bach. I Cannot Think Of Doing Otherwise. It Is A Sort Of Benediction On The House. But That Is Not Its Only Meaning For Me. It Is A Rediscovery Of The World Of Which I Have The Joy Of Being A Part. It Fills Me With Awareness Of The Wonder Of Life, With A Feeling Of The Incredible Marvel Of Being A Human Being.

The Miracle Of Bach Has Not Appeared In Any Other Art. To Strip Human Nature Until Its Divine Attributes Are Made Clear, To Inform Ordinary Activities With Spiritual Fervour, To Give Wings Of Eternity To That Which Is Most Ephemeral; To Make Divine Things Human And Human Things Divine; Such Is Bach, The Greatest And Purest Moment In Music Of All Time.

Do We Dare Be Ourselves? That Is The Question That Counts.

When We Play An Unaccompanied Bach Suite We May Compare Ourselves To An Actor In Shakespeare's Day, Creating Scenery Which Did Not Exist At All, Through The Power Of Declamation And Suggestion. So In Bach. There Is But One Voice -- And Many Voices Have To Be Suggested.