As an improvising musician, I am not in the music business, I am not in the creativity business; I am in the… — Stephen Nachmanovitch Copy Share Image
Creativity can replace conformity as the primary mode of social being. . . . We can cling to that which is passing,… — Stephen Nachmanovitch Copy Share Image
Surrender means cultivating a comfortable attitude toward not knowing, being nurtured by the mystery of moments that are dependably surprising, ever fresh. — Stephen Nachmanovitch Copy Share Image
Faithfulness to the moment and to the present circumstance entails continuous surrender. — Stephen Nachmanovitch Copy Share Image
Improvisation is intuition in action, a way to discover the muse and learn to respond to her call. — Stephen Nachmanovitch Copy Share Image
Writing, playing, composing, painting, reading, listening, looking-all require that we submit to being swept away by Eros, to a transformation of self of the… — Stephen Nachmanovitch Copy Share Image
Play cannot be defined, because in play all definitions slither, dance, combine, break apart, and recombine. — Stephen Nachmanovitch Copy Share Image
Play enables us to rearrange our capacities and our very identity so that they can be used in unforeseen ways — Stephen Nachmanovitch Copy Share Image
If we are transparent, with nothing to hide, the gap between language and being disappears. Then the Muse can speak. — Stephen Nachmanovitch Copy Share Image
Many musicians are fabulously skilled at playing the black dots on the printed page, but mystified by how the dots got there in the… — Stephen Nachmanovitch Copy Share Image
In the art of teaching, we recognize that ideas and insights need to cook over a period of time. Sometimes the student who is… — Stephen Nachmanovitch Copy Share Image
Every moment of life is unique-a kiss, a sunset, a dance, a joke. None will ever recur in quite the same way. Each happens… — Stephen Nachmanovitch Copy Share Image
Every attempt we make is imperfect; yet each one of those imperfect attempts is an occasion for a delight unlike anything else on earth. — Stephen Nachmanovitch Copy Share Image
An improviser does not operate from a formless vacuum, but from three billion years of organic evolution — Stephen Nachmanovitch Copy Share Image
Creative work is play. It is free speculation using materials of ones chosen form. — Stephen Nachmanovitch Copy Share Image
Brahms once remarked that the mark of an artist is how much he throws away. Nature, the great creator, is always throwing things away.… — Stephen Nachmanovitch Copy Share Image
