Quotes About Music

Music expresses feeling, that is to say, gives shape and habitation to feeling, not in space but in time. To the extent that music has a history that is more than a history of its formal evolution, our feelings must have a history too. Perhaps certain qualities of feeling that found expression in music can be recorded by being notated on paper, have become so remote that we can no longer inhabit them as feelings, can get a grasp of them only after long training in the history and philosophy of music, the philosophical history of music, the history of music as a history of the feeling soul.

Country music was the music I was brought up on. It's the music that's closest to my heart and the music that speaks to me the most, and it's always been a big influence on my own songwriting.

I think music for me, it's part of my life. I like music. I think I'm very emotional, so, you know, I just try to take all the emotion, you know, that music bring it to me, you know, some make - I mean, help me to calm down some, for sure motivate me more. You know, there's always music. I think just make me smooth before the match, you know.

I actually quit music and I thought maybe I chose the wrong career. But, I isolated myself in a cabin in the woods for a while and that's where I fell back in love with music. Just being isolated out there, eliminating all these opinions that I endured during my time in LA and the music industry, all the rejection, it was really hard on me and my creativity. So by isolating myself in the wilderness, I was able to fall back in love with music. It was always ingrained in me, always in my blood, but I just lost it for a minute.

I think rap music has made more money on dance music than dance music has made on dance music. Just a thought.

It's too bad music can't be like movies. For me, playing music and listening to music and creating music is very environmental. It creates a certain environment; it sets a specific mood.

Christian music was music that I grew up listening to that I can't say has had much of an impact on anything I have done in my adult life. Maybe Christianity has, but certainly not the bullshit Christian music I was listening to when I was 12. To me there's not much substance in that music. I don't have a message or anything.

I'm into indie music. I think indie is going to bring back the spirit in music. There was a time when it was all about accommodating the music business, the music was getting tasteless, but the spirit is back.

I think that cheap music often does make you dream more than more serious music, whether that's serious music by Beethoven or Miles Davis or Pink Floyd... if the Floyd ever did serious music, which I seriously doubt.

Music was literally in the air at the time, the Vienna of 1780. Everybody played music, classical music. There were in fact so many musicians that in apartment buildings people had to come up with a schedule - you practice at 5 p.m., I'll practice at 6 p.m. That way the music didn't collide with one another.

She [Joni Mitchell] wanted to have that (jazz) element in her music. Of course, when she heard Jaco's [Jaco Pastorius'] music and met him, that floored her -- really grabbed her. She decided that Wayne Shorter was really conducive to her music. She would speak metaphorically about things. "I want this to sound like a taxicab driver, or a taxi in New York," or "I want this to sound like a telephone ringing." She would speak to musicians like that, and we really tuned into what she would want our music to be.

The most important thing is that you make sure you follow the music, which is a musician's way of saying follow your heart. The two things are intertwined. You know, when you even mention the phrase "music business," the older you get, the sourer it sounds. It's a terrible business, you know. Music and business have nothing to do with each other; there's no correlation, so it's always a rub. I would encourage people, don't be swayed by the music business. If you're truly, in your heart, a musician, stay one, and let the business find you.

Music was around in my family in two ways. My mother would occasionally sing to me, but I was mostly stimulated by the classical music my father had left behind. I had an ear for music, I suppose, so that's what began my interest in music.

There is a music for lonely hearts nearly always. If the music dies down there is a silence. Almost the same as the movement of music. To know silence perfectly is to know music.

I love '80s happy music. I love Cyndi Lauper and Madonna, and the idea of making music that's about people celebrating fun. I spent my late adolescence in New York and I used to go to a lot of gay clubs. The music there was always just about love and connection and celebrating life. I think, for people going through something really hard, to go to a place where you can let loose and listen to music as a distraction, that's about a better place, a better way of life - that's where all the attraction lies.

I am interested in the study of music and the discipline of music and the experience of music and music as a esoteric mechanism to continue my real intentions.

As far as my New York influence, one thing I'm proud of in my career is, I rep Brooklyn, New York all day. But people don't look at my music as New York music. People consider my music underground music.

Music is my passion so I feel like I'll be doing this for a long time and God forbid if anything happens I'll still write music. So, I could write music for other people. I see myself making music for a very long time.

Poetry is music though, unfortunately, not all music is poetry. Because music has other carriers to take its message - beats, lyrics, singers, bass players - anyone in music can rise to make a major statement but in poetry there are only words to do the work. And they do sometimes have to sweat.

What good is music? None ... and that is the point. To the world and its states and armies and factories and Leaders, music says, 'You are irrelevant'; and, arrogant and gentle as a god, to the suffering man it says only, 'Listen.' For being saved is not the point. Music saves nothing. Merciful, uncaring, it denies and breaks down all the shelters, the houses men build for themselves, that they may see the sky.

I agree with you about the music of today. It lacks style and emotion. I can't relate to it either, as for grunge music, well that was the death kneel for a lot of the glam metal hair bands of the 80's, so I really do not care for grunge. I miss the 80's as well, it was a truly great decade for music.

I'm not playing up to pretend, I don't live above my means. In my song "96 Cris" I say, "...My bills too low for me to fall off." Honestly, if I never did anything again with music, because I put out my own music, I could pay my bills, forever. I can pay my mortgage off my old music. Of course, you probably wouldn't see me in my Lamborghini but, do you really need a Lambo? That's really what you have to ask yourself.

After the shooting of John Lennon and the early death of so many great stars and the utter naked venal mercantile marketing of pop music and rock music, I don't think anyone really believes that music is anything more than another commodity.

The only reward the musician receives is music: the privilege of standing in the presence of music when it leans over and takes us into its confidence. As it is for the audience. In this moment everything else is irrelevant and without power. For those in music, this is the moment when life becomes real.

There are half a billion people that listen to music online and the vast majority are doing so illegally. But if we bring those people over to the legal side and Spotify, what is going to happen is we are going to double the music industry and that will lead to more artists creating great new music.

I didn't know folk music growing up, no. It's something I've come to study, really, because I think there's so much to learn from traditional music in the sense of the way music began as a way of communication, the traveling storyteller, the bard, the minstrels.

I am deeply saddened to hear about the passing of one of my all time heroes, George Jones. Georges' music was real and he was able to touch thousands through his songs. Not only was he a great singer, but he also had the ability to make you relate to every one of his songs, no matter who you are. He and his music will remain timeless in the world of country music. My thoughts and prayers are with his family through this difficult time.

I heard Q-Tip on the Jungle Brothers' song 'The Promo.' It was very exciting. It was very new. The music and the culture around hip-hop was evolving. I think there's an emotional quality to their music and there's a vulnerability to the music. For me, A Tribe Called Quest was my Beatles.

I had composed songs, I sang, and played the vina. Practising this music I arrived at a stage where I touched the music of the spheres. Then every soul became a musical note, and all life became music. Inspired by it I spoke to the people, and those who were attracted by my words listened to them instead of listening to my songs.

I'm a music storyteller and collaborator. I hear character, location, and story as music. For me a score is there to both heighten the story and to actually tell the story with the unique emotional and narrative powers of music.

Music always stimulates my imagination. When I'm writing I usually have some Baroque music on low in the background chamber music by Bach, Telemann, and the like.

My music is homegrown from the garden of New Orleans. Music is everything to me short of breathing. Music also has a role to lift you up - not to be escapist but to take you out of misery.

Music is a plane of wisdom, because music is a universal language, it is a language of honor, it is a noble precept, a gift of the Airy Kingdom, music is air, a universal existence common to all the living.

You certainly don't hear any country music on pop radio today. But for a while you did, and it was a lovely thing to have all the different genres of music cohabitating the Top 40 - the folk sound, The Beatles, the British sound, the Motown sounds, that kind of light country - it was a welcome relief after a few hard rock records. Everyone was sharing the airwaves, and I think it was a beautiful time for American music.

Folks out in the country couldn't afford to pay for anybody else to make music. They had to make their own. So the peasantry had their music, and it was about a hundred years ago given the name "Folk music".

Through music I either tame my demons or unleash them and allow them to be what they are. I don't want the music to be about provocation, I want the music to bring you to a place where you feel at home

My music is very emotional. The reason why I want to play music is very emotional. I want to call out my emotions and package them into music.

I try to put a lot of our music in my music - by that I mean of American music.

I'm extremely happy about music altogether, and the history that I've made. How I changed the world, music-wise, music over the internet and stuff like that.

Music's totally eclectic now. I saw a DJ the other day, he was on Virgin radio over here, and he said he played "Going Underground", the Jam song, on his breakfast show. Then he got a text from some young kid asking if was a new band. I think a lot of people these days, younger people as well, are aware of all sorts of music, really. If you're into the Libertines you probably also have to be aware of the Beatles, or the Kinks. I think there's a better, possibly greater appreciation for all music, of all eras, I think.

The only music I was listening to for ages was old soul. So I wasn't listening to a lot of new music - especially indie music.

I love music and listen to music all the time, but I didn't realize how much my body needed music. I needed it more than sex.

I kind of always wanted my own music to just sound like, like me, I suppose, like if I was music it would be the music I make, I think.

I like music because... its expressive, you can convey whatever you're thinking through a song. And it's the best respite for me anyway to do it through music. So I like music because you can express and let your soul out through it.

I grew up in New York. We were all diversified, as far as music was concerned. I grew up liking just about everything. So I tried to incorporate that into my playing, although the original school where I came from was Afro-Cuban music. But I liked all kinds of music -- I tried to bring that into everything.

When I was a kid, I liked the newer music that was coming out. I have never really felt confined by any style of music. I would play in bands that were soul bands or that played standards - any kind of music that I enjoyed playing.

It'd be negligent to say that I don't want to be at the top of the charts. Of course I do, it's proof that your song is being heard. But I think it's more about the work for me and being proud of what I'm doing in music than what people think about my music. I want to like my music before you like it. I don't want to sell anything that I don't really like. I don't want to sell myself short just to get to the top of the charts. It doesn't feel that great. Feeling proud of your work feels greater than being at the top of the charts.

I play until my fingers are blue and stiff from the cold, and then I keep on playing. Until I'm lost in the music. Until I am the music--notes and chords, the melody and harmony. It hurts, but it's okay because when I'm the music, I'm not me. Not sad. Not afraid. Not desperate. Not guilty.