Music Quotes

What we have to get clear to kids is that when you offer your stillness and open yourself to the experience of music, it pays you back more than you give.

High school music teachers... nobody makes a living off it.

Great music is its own movie, already. And the challenge, as a music fan, is to keep the song as powerful as it wants to be, to not tamper with it and to somehow give it a home.

Pop is a little bit theatrical. That's the whole vibe. That's the point - is that it's great music, great melodies, great hooks. But, on top of it, it's a presentation. There's a showmanship about it…

Negro music and culture are intrinsically improvisational, existential. Nothing is sacred. After a decade, a musical idea, no matter how innovative, is threatened.

I listen to crazy, robust rock music where they sing their faces off, and soul music, which can be similar.

People often complain that music is too ambiguous, that what they should think when they hear it is so unclear, whereas everyone understands words. With me, it is exactly the opposite, and not only w…

In middle school, I really didn't have music, but in high school, I remember taking a lot of choir and drama.

I've loved Michael Jackson, his music, his music videos.

I was a big fan of Middle Eastern elements of music and experimental electronic and tribal sounds.

I feel like every project I've ever done has had music involved in it somehow.

After my tour I had time to stay at home, be with my boyfriend and hang out with friends and that brought me down to earth and helped me write music from a more relaxed place.

I think the difficult thing is the transition between TV competition series and going into the actual music industry. There still seems to be a slight disconnect there.

I think Lady Gaga is great and is changing pop music and bringing back a certain rock 'n' roll spirit, swagger to the game.

I'm very inspired by past music.

I've sung other people's music all my life.

It's been a transformative period and I really wanted to make music from what I've experienced.

We were raised in an Italian-American household, although we didn't speak Italian in the house. We were very proud of being Italian, and had Italian music, ate Italian food.

I would be a huge hypocrite if I didn't tell you that at one time in my life I thought the way that you made music was you got on a major label and you got famous.

I'm not saying I wasn't flawed or amateurish. But you can never say I did anything to appease the music business.

Music is my life, professionally, for nearly 60 years. To be recognized by the academy is still the highest honor.

I always preferred to hang out with the outcasts, 'cause they were cooler they had better taste in music, for one thing, I guess because they had more time to develop one with the lack of social inte…

What makes my approach special is that I do different things. I do jazz, blues, country music and so forth. I do them all, like a good utility man.

I've programmed myself musically to come up with love-feeling tracks that are romantic, sexy, but classy, all in one. And that's the challenge. Once I create that music, then the lyrical content star…

Music's been around a long time, and there's going to be music long after Ray Charles is dead. I just want to make my mark, leave something musically good behind. If it's a big record, that's the fro…