I was improvising before I was reading music. I was just trying to play things on the clarinet by ear. I think my ear is one of my greatest assets.
Pete Fountain

I was the same kind of father as I was a harpist - I played by ear.
Harpo Marx

I wonder if anyone else has an ear so tuned and sharpened as I have, to detect the music, not of the spheres, but of earth, subtleties of major and minor chord that the wind strikes upon the tree branches. Have you ever heard the earth breathe?
Kate Chopin

I'm always listening and watching; my ear is like a boom mike. And judging, frankly. Constantly judging.
Kathy Griffin

I'm kind of the town pump. I think I have a pretty good ear for what sounds good in this style.
Michael McKean

If I had to put a name to it, I would wish that all my books were entertainments. I think the first thing you've got to do is grab the reader by the ear, and make him sit down and listen. Make him laugh, make him feel. We all want to be entertained at a very high level.
John Le Carre

If you don't generate tension in the film to begin with... you can't really make a purse out of a sow's ear, you know.
Dennis Weaver

If you have a good ear for dialogue, you just can't help thinking about the way people talk. You're drawn to it. And the obsessive interest in it forces you to develop it. You almost can't help yourself.
Robert Towne

If you really believe music is dangerous, you should let it go in one ear and out the other.
Jose Bergamin

If you wish to spare yourself and your venerable family, give heed to my advice with the ear of intelligence. If you do not, you will see what God has willed.
Hulagu Khan

In the Middle Ages and beyond, the target was the Court Jew who had the ear of the ruler; during the Inquisition it was the Spanish Jews who thrived after their conversion to Christianity.
Jack Schwartz

It has always been my practice to cast a long paragraph in a single mould, to try it by my ear, to deposit it in my memory, but to suspend the action of the pen till I had given the last polish to my work.
Edward Gibbon

It is hard to look up to a leader who keeps his ear to the ground.
James H. Boren

It is not the voice that commands the story: it is the ear.
Italo Calvino

It's an ear job, not an eye job.
Donald T. Regan

It's easy to get next to music theory, especially between your peers and music classes and so forth. You just pay attention. I had a good ear, so I realized that printed music was just about reminding you what to play.
Quincy Jones

Learning to read music in Braille and play by ear helped me develop a damn good memory.
Ray Charles

Life is as tedious as twice-told tale, vexing the dull ear of a drowsy man.
William Shakespeare

Life is like music, it must be composed by ear, feeling and instinct, not by rule. Nevertheless one had better know the rules, for they sometimes guide in doubtful cases, though not often.
Philipus Aureolus Paracelsus

Life is like music; it must be composed by ear, feeling, and instinct, not by rule.
Samuel Butler