Some people go to Berlin to get more cutting edge; I went and started wearing lederhosen and going to visit baroque palaces.

I'll be honest, I worry sometimes about what I've done. I have tied my whole person to my art and, whatever it takes to get that hook, I will go there and do it.

All these poses of classical torture ruined my mind like a snake in the orchard. I did go from wanting to be someone, now I'm drunk and wearing flip-flops on Fifth Avenue.

I think my mother, more than anyone, knew the importance of inspiration. If it was occurring, you had to use it.

I've written songs for Shirley Bassey, Marianne Faithfull, and Linda Thompson. I sort of focus on these wonderful, aging divas. But maybe that's because I think I'm Christina Aguilera.

I just think it's better to have ideas. I mean, you can change an idea. Changing a belief is trickier, people die for them, people kill for them.

I strive for what you do find in Shakespeare's work - that there is a definite humanity and a definite character behind the writing in the sonnets, and it's very real because it's so deeply personal. I try to aspire to that in what I do.