JULIAN BREAM

Segovia was a Spaniard and it seemed natural that he should play the guitar.

If the orchestra's not enjoying itself, the concerto will not succeed, with the players confined to using half an inch of bow.

I've always played a lot of Spanish music, but not as much as most guitarists do.

Whatever it is, music should sound spontaneous, I've derived a great deal of pleasure from playing jazz and having the knowledge of that spontaneity.

I was passionately interested in Elizabethan history at school, so it was natural for me as a musician to take interest in the music of that period.

Using modern guitar techniques and modern methods on an early instrument is not a very clever thing to do, because it is the authentic spirit of the instrument that should dictate the quality and characteristic of the sound.

I used to drive myself about in an old Austin van... and then have to sleep in the back because I couldn't afford a hotel.

Ideally the performer has a special function. Which is to bring the listener to the edge of that experience and to open the doors of this perception in such a way that those who wish to enter can.

My father started me off on the guitar, and we learned classical guitar together.

I've had a lovely life. I've had a great life.

Wanting to play the guitar was neither a wild dream nor a realistic ambition. It was simply inevitable.

You have to be serious, and you must have a constantly inquiring mind. But I find it's new music that really stretches me, both technically and as an interpreter.

There is no piece of guitar music that has the formal beauty of a piano sonata by Mozart, or the richly worked out ideas and passion of a late Beethoven string quartet, or for that matter the beautiful mellifluous poetry of a Chopin Ballade.

I'm quite reflective - I listen to music, I read, I walk with Django.

Guitar was just a hobby, but it seemed to me that the instrument had possibilities, not least of which was that there was no one else playing it. I could be, as it were, the best boy in an all-girls school.

I think that the first World War put an end the kind of music that Mahler, Bruckner and Richard Strauss were writing. A change of fashion was needed.

It is difficult to understand the fortunes of an instrument. There was music written for the guitar until the mid-19th century. Then the instrument declined in popularity.

You have to get the attention of the audience. You have to make sure they know you are starting. You have to achieve a rapport with them on the very first chord.

When I was 18, I went into the army as a payroll clerk because otherwise I was headed for Korea.

It's very good for one's brain and muscular system to work in harmony. If you keep up your playing it just keeps things ticking over.

I devoted my life to music for a reason, and the reason wasn't because I wanted to get on or make money, but to try to fulfil myself and also to give people pleasure. That's been my credo.

I found I could speak through the guitar. Because you have the feel of the strings with both hands and it's up against your solar plexus, it's real, and so there's nothing between you and the music.

The lute is tuned differently than the guitar and of course it has many more strings.

The Nocturnal' was very nearly beyond me.

One thing you learn very rapidly in this business is that you are part of a continuing tradition.