Creativity Quote by Andre Kostelanetz

Kostelanetz is sneaking a manifesto into what sounds like gentle self-help. “Personal sounds” isn’t just a plea to build a playlist; it’s an argument for private sovereignty in a culture that’s always trying to score your life for you. Coming from a musician and conductor known for making orchestral music broadly accessible, the line carries an almost democratic conviction: aesthetic pleasure isn’t a credentialed activity. You don’t need permission, training, or a critic’s vocabulary to know what makes you feel “exhilarated and alive” versus “quiet and calm.” You just have to listen closely enough to recognize what works on you.

The phrasing does quiet work. Not “favorite songs,” but “sounds” widens the frame to the everyday: a radiator’s hiss, a subway rhythm, a baseball game on the radio, the particular hush of snow. It turns taste into a kind of emotional emergency kit. Kostelanetz is pointing to sound as a portable technology for mood regulation long before “wellness” became an industry and algorithms started predicting our feelings back at us.

The gendered “his” dates the quote, but the idea is strikingly contemporary: curate what restores you, and guard it. The subtext is that modern life is noisy in the political sense too - crowded with demands, sales pitches, and other people’s urgency. “Listen for” implies intention, even vigilance. Your “personal sounds” are small, repeatable acts of resistance: choosing what enters your head, and letting it change your body.