This site is dedicated to the memory of Dr. Alan William Smolowe who gave birth to the creation of this database.
Gustavo Dudamel and the Teresa Carreño Youth Orchestra
For me to rehearse with a children's orchestra a Mahler symphony was to really work. We had three or four weeks of rehearsal with the orchestra, every day eight or nine hours, putting the First together. I had been conducting Tchaikovsky a lot and Beethoven, but Mahler was different.
There was an air of indifference about them, a calm produced by the gratification of every passion; and through their manners were suave, one could sense beneath them that special brutality which comes from the habit of breaking down half-hearted resistances that keep one fit and tickle one?s vanity?the handling of blooded horses, the pursuit of loose women.
Day | Fate | God | Hate | Life | Life | Nothing | Fate | God |
When all was over at the cemetery Charles returned to the house. There was no one downstairs. He went up into the bedroom and saw her dress hanging up at the foot of the bed. Then, leaning against the secretaire, he remained there till it was dark, lost in sorrowful meditation. After all, she had loved him.
Never give up on what you really want to do. The person with big dreams is more powerful than one with all the facts.
H. L. Mencken, fully Henry Louis Mencken
Before a man speaks it is always safe to assume that he is a fool. After he speaks, it is seldom necessary to assume it.
Is the Church fulfilling a purely religious role when by its silence or friendly relationships it lends legitimacy to dictatorial and oppressive government?
H. L. Mencken, fully Henry Louis Mencken
Explanations exist; they have existed for all time; there is always a well-known solution to every human problem - neat, plausible, and wrong.
H. L. Mencken, fully Henry Louis Mencken
In war the heroes always outnumber the soldiers ten to one.
Television | Wrong |
H. L. Mencken, fully Henry Louis Mencken
A Sunday school is a prison in which children do penance for the evil conscience of their parents.
There is no truth except in its relation, that is to say, the fashion in which we perceive the objects.
H. L. Mencken, fully Henry Louis Mencken
In any combat between a rogue and a fool the sympathy of mankind is always with the rogue.
Life | Life | Television |
H. L. Mencken, fully Henry Louis Mencken
The men the American people admire most extravagantly are the most daring liars; the men they detest most violently are those who try to tell them the truth.
Woman |
H. L. Mencken, fully Henry Louis Mencken
The older I get the more I admire and crave competence, just simple competence, in any field from adultery to zoology.
Action alone is the exclusive prerogative of man; neither a beast nor a god is capable of it, and only action is entirely dependent upon the constant presence of others.
You have to fit in sometimes to make people comfortable to listen to you.
The concept of congruence in Euclidean geometry is not exactly the same as that in non-Euclidean geometry... "Congruent" means in Euclidean geometry the same as "determining parallelism," a meaning which it does not have in non-Euclidean geometry.