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Everybody Has A Different Kind Of Talent And A Different Timetable As To When They Develop.

-Itzhak Perlman

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Everybody Has A Different

Itzhak Perlman

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Everybody Has A Different Kind Of Talent And A Different Timetable As To When They Develop.

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Perhaps Our Task In This Shaky, Fast-changing, Bewildering World In Which We Live Is To Make Music, At First With All That We Have, And Then, When That Is No Longer Possible, To Make Music With What We Have Left.

I Do Three Things. I Do Teaching, I Do Conducting And I Do Playing. And Each One Of Those Sort Of Helps The Other.

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For People Who Are Really Talented, What You Don't Say Becomes Extremely Important. You Have To Judge What To Say And What To Leave Alone So You Can Let The Talent Develop.

I Can't Walk Very Well, But I'm Not Onstage To Do Walking. I'm On The Stage To Play.

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Every Person With A Disability Has A Slightly Different Kind Of Disability. Not Everybody Has The Same Problems. Usually The Wheelchairs Are The Wheelchairs. It's The Same Height And So On. It's A Problem.

I Don't Walk On Stage Unless I'm Playing With A Orchestra. But When I Play A Recital, I'm Sort Of On A Scooter, And I Just Scoot Very Quickly On Stage, And They're Saying, Wow, Look At This. He's So Fast.

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Every Musical Phrase Has A Purpose. It's Like Talking. If You Talk With A Particular Purpose, People Listen To You, But If You Just Recite, It's Not As Meaningful.

The Thing Is That What You Try To Do When You Play Is You Try To Play Not Below A Certain Level. In Other Words, It Can Be A Special Day Where It Would Be Phenomenal, But If It's Not Below A Certain Level, That's The Goal. You Know, That's What You Want To Do. That's Why You Practice And So On.

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I'm Now Doing Three Things: Concerts, Conducting, And Teaching, And They Each Support Each Other. I Learn To See Things From Different Perspectives And Listen With Different Ears. The Most Important Thing That You Need To Do Is Really Listen.

Another Thing That I Don't Like To Do Is Show Too Much How It Goes. I Do It Once In A Blue Moon. Sometimes There Are Lessons When I Don't Pick Up A Violin At All.

The Most Important Thing To Do Is Really Listen.

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Another Thing That You Really Do When You Play, That You're Supposed To Do, Is Colors. You Know, You Cannot Play With One Color. If You Play With One Color, Again, It's Like Watching A Beautiful Painting, A Drawing, But It's All In Blue Or It's All In Red. May Be Very Nice, But Not Very Interesting.

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Everybody Has A Different Kind Of Talent And A Different Timetable As To When They Develop.

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Don't Play The Way It Goes. Play The Way It Is. And The Way It Is Every Time You Play It, It's Slightly Different. Look For Something. So That's The Challenge Not To Be Bored.

Nothing Is Better For My Playing Than Teaching Because When You Teach, You Have To Think And You Have To Listen What Other People Do. And Then All Of A Sudden, You Play Yourself And Then You Say, My Goodness, I Don't Need A Teacher. I'm My Own Teacher. Then I Can React To What I'm Doing Immediately. It Really Improves.

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Same Thing With Harmonies. If You Hear Something That Harmonically Is Interesting, Express It. So That's What I'm Saying About Talking The Music Rather Than Just Playing Through.

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