Robert Fripp Quotes

Usually people think that it is the musicians who create the music, but in fact it is music who creates the musicians.

Music is the wine that fills the cup of silence.

The way we describe our world shows how we think of our world. How we think of our world governs how we interpret our world. How we interpret our world directs how we participate in the world. How we participate in the world shapes the world.

Expectation closes the door to what is happening in the moment.

What has changed in 40 years? It’s very simple: 40 years ago there was a market economy. Today there is a market society – today everything, including ethics, has a price.

In strange and uncertain times such as those we are living in, sometimes a reasonable person might despair. But hope is unreasonable and love is greater even than this. May we trust the inexpressible benevolence of the creative impulse.

Quiet is the absence of sound. Silence is the presence of silence.

The only reward the musician receives is music: the privilege of standing in the presence of music when it leans over and takes us into its confidence. As it is for the audience. In this moment everything else is irrelevant and without power. For those in music, this is the moment when life becomes real.

Discipline is never an end in itself, only a means to an end.

Me and a book is a party. Me and a book and a cup of coffee is an orgy.

Music so wishes to be heard that it sometimes calls on unlikely characters to give it voice.

A mistake is always forgivable, rarely excusable and always unacceptable.

Understanding is simple. Knowing is complicated.

To me, art is the capacity to experience one's innocence: craft is how you get to that point. Maturity in a musician would be the point at which one is innocent at will. At that point the relationship between music and the musician is direct and reliable. The relationship with music is always mysterious: when it works, you can never tell. You can never guarantee when it's going to work. You can only to put yourself in a place where it's more likely to happen.

There are no mistakes, save one: the failure to learn from a mistake.

When music appears which only King Crimson can play, then, sooner or later, King Crimson appears to play the music.

I'm not really interested in music. Music is just a means of creating a magical state.

What we hear is the quality of our listening.

If the audience doesn't hear what is going on, is it going on?

I would like, with the sun shining through the window on a crisp early-autumnal mid-morning, with a sufficiency of Monster Cappucino flowing in my veins to prompt minimal sentience, to declare my view for the record that Drummer Jokes are a cruel and pernicious form of humour introduced to the world by under-humoured persons lacking in sensitivity and concern for other drummers.

When a record company makes a mistake, the artist pays for it. When a manager makes a mistake, the artist pays for it. When the artist makes a mistake, the artist pays for it.

We know others to the extent that we know ourselves.

I recommend my students not to be professional unless they really have to be. I tell them, 'If you love music, sell Hoovers or be a plumber. Do something useful with your life.'

Music is the cup that holds the wine of silence. Sound is that cup, but empty. Noise is that cup, but broken.

Beginner's luck is great for beginners.