Rufus Wainwright Quotes

I knew I was gay when I was around 13. There wasn't the internet, there weren't support groups, AIDS was everywhere. I mean, it was really dark.

And you will believe in love And all that it's supposed to be But just until the fish start to smell And you're struck down by a hammer.

I came out of the closet very young, and I had to cut my teeth pretty fast.

I really need to know I may just never see you again, or might as well You took advantage of a world that loved you well I'm going to a town that has already been burnt down I'm so tired of you, America.

One day you will come to Montauk and see your dad playing the piano And see your other dad wearing glasses Hope that you will want to stay for a while Don't worry I know you'll have to go

I definitely was always expected and encouraged to be a songwriter from a very young age, ... But really it's because, as a child, I thought I was Judy Garland. And when I started out, I was a little nuts. I thought I was a classic, legendary superstar when only 10 people knew who I was. I feel in some ways that my confidence is misinterpreted as arrogance, which is understandable. But I've also always thought that false modesty is evil.

I am undefinable. I don't fit into any particular category.

Life is the longest death in California.

I am under no illusion that I will ever be the greatest opera composer in the world, with Wagner and Verdi and Strauss before me. I think my work could fit very nicely into musicals, though.

You know the question: 'How do you get to Carnegie Hall?' Answer: 'Practise?' Well, in my case, I got there by not practising. I didn't finish my music degree. And when I got into the pop world, I decided not to conform because I figured that the point of being an artist was that you shouldn't be like anyone else.

In the present world, this technological, psychotic, politicised, nonsensical world, you have to believe that the good guys are going to win! That evil will be banished somehow!

I bemoan the fact that all my famous friends have places in St. Bart's and I have to go to Montauk.

When it came to using elements of your personal life in your work, my mother was the master, or the mistress. There were three or four songs she wrote about my father - songs about failed love.

I definitely have a Luddite's approach to what's going on. I find that as I get older, I get stupider.

I like to make the mundane fabulous whenever I can.

That will to love is very powerful. But it doesn't always win.

I'd be hanging out in my bathrobe all day, stinky, just writing, and my mom allowed me to do this-as long as I was writing songs. She said, 'As long as you're seriously working on music, I'll support you. Don't get a job, because if you work, it will crush you.

I'm your knight in shining armor. I'm here to save you from Linkin Park.

My cheeks explode when I smile. Thats why I have to look so nonplussed.

I think the minute you mention death, people run for the hills - unless it's heavy metal. People do not like death.

My greatest experiences in the theatre and the most religious experiences in my life - of which going to the opera is one for me - have been with the Romantic composers' repertoire: it's Wagner, it's Strauss, Verdi, Puccini. That era gets me every time.

Writing an opera and premiering in England, you could say I was going right into the eye of the storm and I came out successfully. A little tattered and bruised, but so what, I made it.

I am ridiculously high-maintenance.

My love of classical hit pretty early. I was 13 when it occurred, and that was really the only music I listened to for many, many years. I went to a conservatory, but I always knew I would be in the pop world, because A) it was more fun and B) you didn't have to practice as much and you could go out more. But I immediately saw this opportunity to inject my material with these sounds that most members of my generation really didn't know about, so it was a great way to differentiate myself from the pack.

I will take my coffee black / never snack / hang with the wolves who are sheepish.

You had to be an over-the-top, demanding, dramatic figure in order to progress as a woman in Europe over the last few hundred years. Now people say, "You're being such a prima donna," meaning you're being hard to deal with or crazy. It's a bit sexist.

I think we could all be a bit more elitist.

The Germany I was enthused with was more old fashioned and kind of romantic. I just got there, and the next thing you know, I had this huge gilded album. It was kind of an amazing experience because I didn't intend it to be that way.

I'm a big fan of the Pre-Raphaelites. Millais, Edward Burne-Jones, and I realised recently that my music is Pre-Raphaelite in a certain way, in that it reinvents an older era and romanticises it, puts it in this gilded frame.

Certainly in terms of my life - anybody's life - you go through death, childbirth and marriage, glory and defeat, and so on.

I've developed a bit of a fascination with John Denver. I always thought he was kind of tacky and somewhat revolting and had a kind of simplistic weirdness, but on second listen, he actually did have an incredible voice, and the blatant naiveté of his work is straight-edge, in a way.

I think my imagination and my passions are still firing away, but it's really the body that starts to make up the rules. It's not a major problem; it's just when you get a little older you realize how much your body thanks you when you are good to it.

Once you've fallen from classical virtue, won't have a soul for to wake up and hold you.

The more hedonistic you were, the better...I very much subscribed to that as a young artist.

I am regarded as a usurper, as an imposter and dilettante, because I do technically come from the wrong side of the tracks in musical terms.

I do not consider myself a guitar player. My father is a guitar player - I'm not.

I should write a musical. That is probably one of the final areas that I should pay attention to, because it does kind of involve everything. It's got theatre, it's got young, pretty people... And it's got money!

To me, songs come of their own volition - and with an open-ended philosophy.

There's prejudice everywhere. I don't think the music industry is as bad as the movie industry. But I have taken a few hits over the years for my sexuality, and for being honest about my life. In the end, it's the music that rules the roost.

I really do fear that I'm dying I really do fear that I'm dead I saw it in your eyes what I'm looking for I saw it in your eyes what will make me live.

One of the main destructive forces within our family has been these runaway egos. I think if you look at any show business family, that struggle exists.

Once illness strikes, you realize there's not a lot of time for you to do what you really need to do. And there's no time like the present.

Growing up, for years and years I had no idea what the plots of operas were, and that's part of what fascinated me - I could make them up and learn bits and pieces of what was going on over time. There's something about it being always a step away that makes it more fun to chase.

I personally don’t have the ability to lie about my life, for better or for worse.

My mother had a lot of parties when I was a child. There'd always be a moment when she would place me on the upright piano and have me sing Somewhere Over the Rainbow.

Mowing your lawn is against nature.

I have a three-year-old daughter, which makes me more environmentally conscious. For me, it's about the future.

I made the decision to take on board the critical feedback. Reviews are something you can easily ignore as a performer or writer but I chose to not ignore them here and I think that I benefited. I think I'm stronger for it - and I have a tougher skin as a result.