Quote

I think of a piece of music as something that comes alive when it is being performed, and I feel that my role in the transmission of music is to be its best advocate at that moment.

Yo-Yo Ma

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Yo-Yo Ma
Age: 69
Born: 1955
Born: October 7
Actor
Cellist
Composer
Music Pedagogue
Musician
Paris
France
Yo Yo Ma
YoYo Ma
Think
Moment
Transmission
Thinking
Comes
Advocate
Moments
Performed
Best
Piece
Music
Role
Feel
Pieces
Feels
Roles
Something
Alive

More quotes by Yo-Yo Ma

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But an innovation, to grow organically from within, has to be based on an intact tradition, so our idea is to bring together musicians who represent all these traditions, in workshops, festivals, and concerts, to see how we can connect with each other in music.
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One of the most interesting aspects of the film project was collaborating with so many people - directors, filmmakers, and writers - over a five-year period. I learned that there are two components to this.
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What came up at age 49 is I realized that of all the things I'm interested in, the thing I'm most interested in is figuring out what makes people tick, why people think the way they do, why they act the way they do. And I realized that music is such a great way to investigate why people do what they do.
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Nobody else can make the sound you make.
Yo-Yo Ma
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I don't always have a five-year plan. One thing you must do in life is keep your learning curve as high as possible.
Yo-Yo Ma
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Many of the Central Asians know Russian, and Ted Levin speaks it fluently. I speak Chinese, but Mongolian is completely different, so we had to have translators.
Yo-Yo Ma
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When we have a good balance between thinking and feeling... our actions and lives are always the richer for it.
Yo-Yo Ma
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As a child, you respond physically, tactically. You're delighted by sound, you're delighted by recognizing something. It's like hide and seek. Is it there? Is it not there? Is it this note? Is it not this note? It's one fantastic game.
Yo-Yo Ma
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I play an instrument that has four strings, and I'm still trying to get it right. What I've tried to do in the process of playing these four strings is to try and understand the people I meet, the stories they have to tell. And then become an advocate for them and their stories through music.
Yo-Yo Ma
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Sharing is a much better way to communicate than proving.
Yo-Yo Ma
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I think there are so many ways to become interested in music. I believe signs of sustained interest gives a sense of the right time. Music, if thought of as a language, would perhaps indicate that as early as possible is not so bad. I do believe that a really nurturing first teacher that makes the child love something is crucial.
Yo-Yo Ma
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In performance, we have a greater purpose. The greater purpose is that we're communing together, and we want this moment to be really special for all of us. Because otherwise, why bother to have come at all? It's not about proving anything. It's about sharing something.
Yo-Yo Ma
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Music is one of the ways we can achieve a kind of shorthand to understand each other.
Yo-Yo Ma
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The tango is really a combination of many cultures, though it eventually became the national music of Argentina.
Yo-Yo Ma
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Music has always been transnational people pick up whatever interests them, and certainly a lot of classical music has absorbed influences from all over the world.
Yo-Yo Ma
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One of the things I love about music is live performance.
Yo-Yo Ma
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Practicing is not only playing your instrument, either by yourself or rehearsing with others - it also includes imagining yourself practicing. Your brain forms the same neural connections and muscle memory whether you are imagining the task or actually doing it.
Yo-Yo Ma
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I have yet to find something that beats the power of being in love, or the power of music at its most magical.
Yo-Yo Ma
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You go through phases. You have to reinvent reasons for playing, and one year's answer might not do for another.
Yo-Yo Ma
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Sound is ephemeral, fleeting, but some sort of a physical manifestation can help you hold on to it longer in time. I'm sure of this I've always thought the sound that you make is just the tip of the iceberg, like the person that you see physically is just the tip of the iceberg as well.
Yo-Yo Ma