- home - about - drawings - music - quotes - blog - links -
(türkçe)

music:

---

"I had a world premiere not too long ago... it was in my apartment." - Christian

"I don't ever have the desire to sing anymore, not even in the shower. I am silent in the shower." - Aimee

"The way I cook is like the way I write music. I never know what I'm making until it's done." - Andrea

"Whenever I know the conductor's getting frustrated at me, I end up making even more mistakes 'cause I'm flustered. Thanks, human psychology. That was a good touch." - Tom

"When you say something's cheesy, I just assume it would sound like music to me." - Dustin

"This music is giving me a headache. Makes me wanna die a little bit." - Aimee

"It's like you have the whole skeleton of your piece already, and you just have to do the make-up." - Andrea, about writing chord progressions

"It's like having a baby all the time. The labor is hard, but the product is wonderful." - Andrea, about composing music

"My spelling sucks now cause I have been a music major for too long." - Christa

"I want a Palestrina band." - Aimee

"My college conductor just wasn't as cuddly as Mr. Rhodes." - Aimee

"Have you all seen the one where Bugs Bunny does the Barber of Seville? It's brilliant. But don't sound like that." - Bill

"Sopranos, two things: rhythm and pitch." - Bill

"It sounded like a football cheer, gentlemen." - Bill

"All right, tenors, you only suck in that one bar." - Bill

"So y'all are from MIT? Show me how to play blackjack! Christmas caroling is nice, but show me where the money is!" - guy at the hospital, when the choir went caroling there

"I was going through a mental journey of it, and it was arduous. Maybe I'm out of shape with my mental journeys, I don't know." - Prof. Harbison

"I wish I could freestyle. It's like making up a cadenza, except you're trying to insult someone. It must feel pretty good." - Justin

"Today in sightsinging lab, I used the solfege syllable 'ut' instead of 'do.'" - Nina

"There's nothing better than driving down PCH while listening to trance." - Steven

"Does that kid have a reed in his mouth? It sounds like he has an oboe double reed stuck in his throat." - Reed

"It's super playing from the part. It's so relaxing." - Prof. Harbison

"If anything's hard to play, just change the note." - Justin, advising the quartet that's performing his composition

"We have enough dominant preparation for three or more pieces. He should have saved it up." - Prof. Harbison, about a Mozart piece

"Mozart, if he were here, would jump up, tear his wig off, and walk on it." - Prof. Harbison

"I have a 21M.301 [beginning music theory class] tune stuck in my head since last Thursday." - Prof. Robison

"I was telling my mom something about reading a ruler, and I said sixteenth notes instead of sixteenth of an inch, and then I did it three more times. I can't help myself or stop it." - Christa

"If it was a bit purpler..." - Prof. Harbison, about a student's music

"My playing is a little better... by accident." - Prof. Harbison

"The harmonic deployment is a little bit gauche here." - Prof. Harbison

"It's so hard to stop Alberti bass, because when you stop, it could get awkward." - Prof. Harbison

"What you've got here are bizarre but not impossible progressions." - Prof. Harbison

"Wow, I'm in E flat. Now let's make it sound like I intended to get there." - Prof. Harbison

"I've had my guitar since fourth grade, and it doesn't have one scratch on it. So bite me." - Christa

"So if they tried me in court, I would say it was a crime of passion, the keyboard throwing. Like walking in on your spouse cheating. You know. Not being able to play chorales. Same thing." - Christa

"Oo, we're Coldplay. Listen to our driving rhythms as they make you nuts in the head. You know what Coldplay sounds like? BAM BAM BAM BAM BAM BAM." - Christa

"Choir is a weird species." - Aimee

"Pff! I fart better rhythms than that!" - Mr. Huls

"There will be a reception on stage after the concert. I think there will be cookies and things like that. I don't know about you, but I always feel like a steak after I play." - Prof. Shadle

"For the rest of school, dead week is dead. But for music majors, dead week means that's when we're dead." - Christa

"If I taught with the energy you're giving me, you'd be more bored than you are right now." - Mr. Huls

"Oh, Elaina! These aren't direct fifths! They're parallel fifths. You're too modest." - Prof. Shadle

"When I'm sick, I can't write music. The dots are on the page, but they're not related to each other in any coherent way." - Prof. Shadle

"The people's key of C major." - Bill

"Years ago, an MIT student decided to set the 'to be and not to be' soliluquy from Hamlet to a fast waltz.. it just isn't." - Prof. Shadle

"Do not play unfinished music for girlfriends. It's dangerous." - Prof. Shadle

"I also play like a pig when I'm sick, so it's gonna be a treat for everybody." - Prof. Shadle

"So why is this ambiguous? Because it's Schumann. Yes, the poor, insane man had syphilis and didn't make any sense." - Prof. Shadle

"It's spring, I'm in love, so anything is possible. F# minor is possible. A major is possible." - Prof. Shadle

"Isn't it great that the nightingales sing in four-part harmony? It's wonderful. All the leading tones resolve up. Wonderfully trained creatures." - Prof. Shadle, about the symbolism in a song

"It's like he gets so lost that he forgets how harmony works." - Prof. Shadle

"Yes, it sounds like Broadway, because the harmony's out of control." - Prof. Shadle

"Complain in low notes, then do parallel octaves and say it's over." - Prof. Shadle

"It feels weird being a music major. I've been feeling like all I've been doing for the past quarter is writing music like crazy. It's like I'm bulimic, being forced to puke out notes even when I'm not inspired, and that's what I've been doing day and night. When I actually write real words and letters, it feels really weird." - Andrea

"EW, I'm going sharp. Melike this is PATHETIC. I'm sitting in my big bed, under my sheets, propped up against two pillows. I have a giant keyboard on my lap with a book of music in the little music stand." - Christa

"This music can be best described as rustic. It's off in the fields. They can't play too many parts at the same time." - Prof. Shadle, about a scherzo

"If Bill's conducting is North, this guy's conducting is.. south, southwest." - Thomas

"Dees is having a party on a Thursday night?! What is he thinking!? We all have piano tests in the morning." - Christa

"Conducting is fun, except I tripped on the stairs on my way to class." - Aimee

"THERE'S NO 3RD IN THE CHORD! I THOUGHT YOU HAD TO HAVE A 3RD IN THE CHORD!! ...no you don't." - Prof. Robison

"If you need help, look at Haydn, Mozart, and Beethoven. You can also e-mail me." - Prof. Robison

"What I'm saying is open your software to this document, CUT the chromatic idea, and paste it on a new document and play around with that." - Prof. Robison

"My undergraduate voice teacher is retiring. I can't make the recital, but I wrote her something which at one point breaks into a showtune." - Prof. Robison

"I left during intermission. I felt hostaged by major and minor chords." - Bill, about a minimalism concert

"He had a weird mushroom in that bar." - Bill, about a measure in Bach's g minor mass

"That Bach... he knew a thing or two." - Bill

"Saxophones are like the workhorse in the band, just like how the strings are in an orchestra. More notes per square inch, but not more money." - Prof. Harvey

"Most people don't have MIT pianos." - Prof. Harvey

"Those weird square things were for when they had ukuleles. Now nobody plays them except for Tiny Tim." - Prof. Harvey, about a lead sheet

"Sightreading is hard. Tap your foot. You can't do it in classical music, but you'd better do it in jazz or you're dead." - Prof. Harvey

"I kept waking up last night over and over again, so annoyed, because all I could dream about was music. It's a curse. I dream about modes and theory and songs I'm learning. I just see black and white, lines and notes, lines and notes. UGH. I should not be analyzing Italian iv chords in my sleep. There is something unhealthy about that." - Christa

"Isn't it one of the most gangsterous things you've ever heard in Your Entire LIFE!!!!!!!!" - Steven, about a song he likes

"Today I had to send home my accompanist because he didn't know his music. I felt like a diva." - Christa

"Music and math have a lot in common, except the Frobenius method." - Prof. Margetis

"You're like a complex piece of music, beautiful but hard to read." - Chris

"I won this music award at Pepperdine and I got like 4 thousand dollars, and I didn't even do anything. They just sent me this thing in the mail that was like, 'congratulations.' It just says music award." - Steven

"I've learned that around here, you should scat whenever possible." - Christa

"You know you're a music major when you're watching a movie in the theatre but you're thinking about whether that cadence in your music was a perfect one or imperfect." - Christa

"It's not F; it's G dorian, so shh." - Mr. Rhodes

"I wrote 8th notes instead of 16th notes. I smoked crack in the morning." - Steven

"Ok I just completely sang the wrong notes in like the key of Z." - Mr. Rhodes

"People can't hear overtones, and I'm like, 'You stupid...'" - Steven

"Hey, woman, do you wanna step in my body for like five minutes and hear some mad-ass overtones?" - Steven

"The five lines is so that you don't have to write super teeny. Like Melike, she could fit like an entire year's worth of music on a piece of paper *this big*." - Mr. Rhodes

"Arrgh! I love fixed-do solfege! I'll totally teach it to my children (that I won't have for a long time)." - Tom

"I think I got the major third down!, after singing 'sol do sol do sol do' a hundred times. I mean MI!" - Christa

"In the beginning! There was rhythm." - Mr. Rhodes

"Just chillin'.. listening to some castrati sing.. Ya know, the usual." - Steven, when asked, 'what's up?'

"Oo and whenever we are gonna sing a cappella in choir and somebody whips out a pitchpipe, I'll be like, 'no, no,' and hit the tuning fork against my head." - me

"This alto line -- I don't want to sound harsh, but -- is an abomination towards nature." - Prof. Robison

"You have graduated from the pitchpipe." - Prof. Wood, regarding tuning forks

"I expect that you go across campus checking on your A." - Prof. Wood

"Oh.. my goodness. We got this audition package, it's a HUGE extravaganza. This guy like had his picture put on the cover of this big plastic package, and inside he included a bag of.......nuts..... apparently he is the character on the package 'elmer,' and a video, and this fancy resume. Wow. Wow. HAHAHHAHA. We are all laughing at it now." - Christa

"My score goes from page 75 to 89. I like the worn-in score, but this is bad." - Bill

"We were singing lydian scales for him, and one girl didn't sharp the 4, consistently, and he looked at her and cracked up." - Christa

"I can see the sound coming out of their mouths...I can see their heads just 'hwaaaaah!'" - Mr. Rhodes, talking about overtones

"Like if I shave it all off then I can get one of those neat henna tattoos...like a treble clef." - Mr. Rhodes, talking about his hair options

"Does anybody know what it's called? It's called terrace dynamics... as in patio." - Prof. Wood

"Oops! That's what you get when you make an atonal professor teach tonal harmony." - Prof. Robison, when he played a wrong chord

"So what did I do about that?... I changed the key! Hah hah hah hah haaa!" - Prof. Robison

"I know someone who became a composer to appease his parents, and he's tonedeaf. Don't get me started." - Prof. Robison

"I have a confession. Some people have chemical dependencies. I have a dependency on dissonant suspension." - Prof. Robison

"Putting that juicy, creepy crawly chromatic motion on the soprano." - Prof. Robison

"Dominance. Dominosity. dominitude.. of the harmony." - Prof. Robison

"Then we get this medieval - or heavy metal - sonority." - Prof. Robison, on open fifths

"A nonchord tone approached by a leap! What's that called? 'Don't.'" - Prof. Robison

"The semitone emphasizes the neighborosity." - Prof. Robison

"Is this chord legal? Would dead guys in powdered wigs use this chord? Of course! It's at the end of the bar and it's on a weak beat." - Prof. Robison, while playing a ridiculously dissonant chord

"Okay, so that's a little too much decoration." - Prof. Robison, when somebody's cell phone started ringing while he was demonstrating something on the piano

"UGH! The power went out in the practice buildings, and I was playing piano with my cell phone as a light, and then my phone ran out of batteries! What is going ON here!?" - Christa

"This was a real first for me.....I've had dogs in the audience, singers fainting, an entire bass section come in a page early, lost my grip on my baton and tossed it into the audience....but never had a harpist break a string!!!! This was one for the books." - Bill

"I came in too soon and you followed me. Just like sheep to slaughter." - Bill

"You're good musicians! That's why you're in this choir. Okay, so I made a few mistakes." - Bill

"I think I threw a bum cue to the basses." - Bill

"I'm sorry, but I can't hit a high E. It's just not in my DNA." - Tulasi

"He thinks he's a tenor! HE'S NOT A TENOR. He's a baritone. I'm like dude, go sing down the toilet or something." - Christa

"Ugh tenors make me so mad. Why are they like the lowest on the totem pole of brains!?" - Christa

"So yeah today in class my professor was like, yeah I bet that not very many of you have heard medieval music before and he threw on this CD and I just wanted to stab myself in the chest. It was so badly sung. It was just some crap group trying to sound smart and 'of the period.' Their countertenor sounded like a wailing cat, and the tenor sounded like a chicken." - Steven

"Tenors are never real tenors, so they strain til you want to put them out of their misery." - Christa

"Basses, that G natural is still a crap shoot." - Bill

"Basses, that was really... mediocre. Let's do it again. It looks like you're doing it, but I don't hear it." - Bill

"Sit up. Don't sing into your crotch. That doesn't do anyone good." - Bill

"Sopranos, you're singing about death, and it sounds like you're singing Happy Birthday!" - Mr. Rhodes

"I think if I lived 200 years ago, I would have been a castrato. I would have volunteered." - Steven

"Basses, your line doesn't have any movement to it! It's sittin' there like yesterday's mashed potatoes. Weird analogy..." - Bill

"Sopranos, it says 'And tho' my flesh and spirit grow faint.' It sounds like you're ripping off my flesh." - Bill

"A piano is a forte that's held back, like a dog tied to a leash. A pianissimo is the same thing but with a shorter leash." - Mr. Rhodes

"It needs to be elegant. Yours is a bit like cheerleading. Pompoms for Jesus." - Bill

"You need to accent the 16th notes. Otherwise, it sounds flabby. It sounds like a drinking song." - Bill

"Do it once again, basses, and now have a sense that it's tonal." - Mr. Rhodes

"Last night, I couldn't sleep because I was thinking up this awesome harmony for 'My Bonnie Lies Over the Ocean.' It had violins and a flute and everything." - Christa

"You know, this concert's not so far away. I try not to be alarmed, but I am." - Bill

"Lacking in excitement, lacking in detail. It's very mezzo-boring!" - Bill

"I'd like you to use your imagination. Not with the pitch and rhythm, but with articulation." - Bill

"Blastissimo. Crescendo from blastissimo. It should be bloodcurdling." - Bill

"That was good! Wait, why did I stop, then? Oh yeah, the C# sucked." - Bill

"Ah! So good! You don't sing it well, but the music's beautiful." - Bill

"You sing mezzoforte to mezzoforte point five." - Bill

"Please! Get thee to a practice room!" - Bill

"Sing real pitches!" - Bill

"We were given the bassline and he was all 'harmonize this' and I was all 'ok.'" - Garrett

"Now... this is a very sexy chord." - Prof. Shadle

"All those people who write symphonies all have so much grey hair. That's what kinda made me not want to write orchestras. I was like watching the Grammy awards, and then like all the people nominated for best film score were all old and moldy." - Andrea

"Last night I had a dream that Ella Fitzgerald, Louis Armstrong, and Tony Bennet came to my house to do a show just for me. It was lovely." - Christa

"I'm listening to Debussy, man this guy must be hard to play. I mean there's a million shades of everything." - Reed

"I was in the music computer lab, and my phone rang, and some guy started singing along with the Gloria! I almost got on one knee and proposed to him right then and there." - Christa

"Good, just make it up! It's convincing!" - Bill

"Excitement is good. Cheerful is bad. It's a requiem, hello!" - Bill

"I want to go to a choir rehearsal! Like a dress rehearsal. I have a sudden need." - Christa

"A big choir can sound so badass it still freaks me out on occasion." - Garrett

"Choir is so organized. Band just goes off like a herd of donkeys." - Jocelyn, on concerts

"Choir sounds almost as bad as band. At least they brainwash you into thinking that you like it so you'll come back for more. With band they make sure you hate it, but you can't stop going there. Like getting kicked in the groin." - Reed

"Imagine you have a nut between your buttcheeks, and when you come to that high note, crack the nut." - Simon Carrington

"Today I was talking on the phone to my friend Julia and I said something like 'Yeah, we should work on some music together this summer.' And there was just silence. Then I said 'Um, I dunno, I thought it sounded fun.' Silence. 'Well, okay...' Silence. 'Hello?' And that's when I realized Julia's phone had run out of batteries and I was talking to nobody. Woo-hoo!" - Tom

"Life is short. Credo is long." - Mr. Rhodes

"Intonation is like body odor. Nobody's going to tell you about it. That doesn't mean you don't stink." - Dr. Kean

"Sometimes I go flat, sometimes I go sharp. It's okay. It's a way of life." - Aileen

"K this is what I don't like: if you give someone an A 440 to sing, and they sing 439 or 441.. That's what I don't like." - Steven

"I wanna sing with people that can sing on pitch like me, ya know?" - Steven

"Melike, when something isn't in tune it makes me wanna kill myself, so imagine listening to that crap." - Steven

"I'm getting tired of singing in choir, especially singing with incompetent singers. I think I'm going to have a soloist career." - Steven

"Bassoons remind me of Amazon jungles." - me

"You know what I'd like to learn to play? The fiddle. How cool would that be." - Robert

"Were you at the audition last year? It was so uplifting, because nobody else could sing!" - Sam

"This music is three hundred years old. Are any of you three hundred years old? That obviously means that this music is more important than you are. So don't ruin it." - Mr. Rhodes

"You know, I've been downloading a lot of movie music, like Sixth Sense music. Man, I get so scared when I listen to it home alone." - Andrea

"The concert is on Friday. There is no time for smiling." - Mr. Rhodes

"It's not your job during the performance to think. It is your job to react to the conductor." - Mr. Rhodes

"It's important that all the boys go [caroling] because the old ladies like to look at you." - Mr. Rhodes

"I will unlock the voice within you." - Mr. Rhodes

"But the girls have ridiculously long dresses. Last year Elena taped candy to her legs." - Jessica, about sneaking food into a concert

"Melike, your music is very amusing." - Mr. Rhodes, when he saw the quotes scribbled along the margins of my music

"It terrifies my soul that you, like, blog and journal about choir... and that, like, this will be on the website. It disturbs my soul." - Mr. Rhodes

"Intonation is like body odor; nobody's going to tell you about it. That doesn't mean you don't stink." - Dr. Kean

"I'm not that ignorant of music. I'm not one of those people who see a treble clef and call it a sharp." - my mom

"I thought choir was for dorks, but my friend told me, 'Hey, there are cute girls in choir,' and so I decided to join." - Eric Whitacre

"I don't wanna get a B in choir! The next time Mr. Rhodes's pitch pipe doesn't work and he relies on me to give an A as a starting note, I'll tell him, 'I'll give you an A if you give me an A!" - Andrea

"Okay, the next person who uses the Requiem as a weapon is going to get kicked out of the room." - Mr. Rhodes

"What do you get if you put a magnifying glass on Bach's greatest work? The magnification!" - Aimee

"Carols used to have bawdy lyrics back then... that means they were dirty and nasty." - Mr. Rhodes

"Back then people used to sing about love, girls, and sex... oh, and also God, but that was only in the church." - Mr. Rhodes

"Nick, sit away from Taylor. Yes, the two of you together equal a quarter step flat." - Mr. Rhodes

"If we don't go through all of this music today, none of you are getting any thin mints!" - Mr. Rhodes

"Sing, and the world sings with you. Laugh and sing, at the same time, and oh lordy, the world will not laugh with you! They will laugh at you! Mock you! Throw rotten tomatoes at you in a violent rage!" - Aimee

"It was like a cow being hit by a moose dying in the forest both with ducks being showed up their asses. I guess the cow is the soprano, the moose the tenor.. which leaves us altos and the basses as the ducks. I feel bad for us." - Aimee, about something she composed

"Choir makes me happy. Scratch that--choir makes me sad. Rather, I think choir makes me confused." - Aimee

"Ah.. spoiling the brains of the young, sucking them into the vortex known as choir." - Aimee