Daily Inspiration Quote by Virgil Thomson

Criticism, Virgil Thomson implies, isn’t a tribunal handing down verdicts; it’s a field report. “You explain how it went” puts the emphasis on the lived event: what was actually heard, what happened in the room, what the work did in time. That’s a composer’s demand as much as a critic’s ethic - description before doctrine. It’s also a quiet rebuke to the kind of review that arrives pre-written, where the critic’s taste poses as law and the performance becomes an excuse to perform the critic.

The second clause sharpens the blade: “as far as you can figure out how it got that way.” Thomson isn’t asking for omniscience. He’s insisting on causality, but with humility. You trace the chain: choices in orchestration, tempo, balance, training, rehearsal time, institutional habits, even the venue’s acoustics. That “as far as you can figure out” is doing moral work, fencing off the critic’s favorite vice - motive-mongering dressed up as insight. You don’t invent the composer’s psychology; you reconstruct the conditions.

Context matters: Thomson wrote in an American 20th-century moment when modernism, nationalism, and the culture industry were all fighting over who got to define “serious” music. His line treats criticism as craft, not mystique. It’s democratic in the best sense: if you can pay attention, name what occurred, and argue for plausible reasons, you’re already closer to truth than anyone waving credentials.