Top 100 Quotes About Festivals
#1. We live a life that is often spent in crowds - parties, festivals and first nights - so it's nice to avoid them.
Julian Fellowes
#2. I think one of the things the writers' festival does that is very good is that it brings writers from around the world and around the country and locally and puts them all in the one spot together, and that's what a lot of the world's great writers' festivals do.
Nick Earls
#3. Ever since I've left, I've been doing nothing but this film and traveling, promoting and doing festivals. So the good thing is that I'm not sitting around pining over whether I made the right choice in leaving. I'm moving and grooving.
Eriq La Salle
#4. We enjoyed the fact that we were called to the folk festivals and we got to know Joan Baez, Dylan. We were singing strictly gospel, but then after we started hearing songs that they would sing, we saw that those songs were very fitting for us because they were singing the truth, and truth is gospel.
Mavis Staples
#5. When my stories were translated into other languages and received good reviews in the international press and won prizes, some Arab festivals and newspapers began to take an interest in what I had produced. This sudden Arab interest is a form of hypocrisy and nonsense.
Hassan Blasim
#6. For the wise man, every day is a festival.
Plutarch
#7. We sent a troupe to Edinborough, and then in Edinborough, there was a producer from the Melbourne Comedy Festival, so we went to Melbourne. So it's one of these shows that kind of organically developed and it started developing momentum way before I even thought there was a show here.
Brian Henson
#8. If we see their (Navajo) lives and festivals as fantastic and our lives as ordinary, we come to writing with a sense of poverty. We must remember that everything is ordinary and extraordinary.
Natalie Goldberg
#9. I've never liked what's meant to be cool. I was asked to do Glastonbury the year before last actually, but I couldn't make it. I would have liked to, but I'm not really a festival man.
Tony Blackburn
#10. I listen to all types of different music. I go to different festivals. I'm around music.
Rico Love
#11. I just wanna perform, I wanna get back on the scene, I wanna do all the festivals and stuff like that. I don't necessarily want to do all the bullshit that comes with it, like tons and tons of interviews, unnecessary things and all that.
Lady Sovereign
#12. Of all the old festivals, however, that of Christmas awakens the strongest and most heartfelt associations. There is a tone of solemn and sacred feeling that blends with our conviviality, and lifts the sprit to a state of hallowed and elevated enjoyment.
Washington Irving
#13. Toronto Film Festival is one of those festivals where there are 400 movies, and unless you have a distributor who is super confident and puts a lot of money into it, sometimes movies can go unwatched or unnoticed.
Viggo Mortensen
#14. In small towns, bored teenagers turn their eyes longingly to the exciting doings in the big cities, pining for urban amenities like hipster bars and farmers' markets and indie-rock festivals. Like everyone else, they want the vibrant and they will not be denied.
Thomas Frank
#15. Don't you love fall?" Stacey asked. "All the little festivals, the changing leaves, kids in Halloween costumes, the dead spewing up out of their graves to haunt the living ...
J.L. Bryan
#16. Doing that, then doing a lot of theater, which I love. Doing guest stars, did two independent films that are going around to all these festivals. Both of them are going to be at the Lake Tahoe Film Festival.
Austin Peck
#17. Only in Texas can mesquite have its own festival, then there's a crawfish festival, a festival for strawberries, everything has its own festival, with each town having their own yearly thing.
Kevin Fowler
#18. I've been to the Reading festival twice before-as a punter, though I stayed backstage in the hospitality tent!
Bruce Dickinson
#19. (On literary festivals) When you go and see a band play live, you are watching it do on stage what it is meant to do. When you watch an author perform live, you are, most of the time, watching a dog walk on its hind legs.
Nicholas Lezard
#20. If extravagance were a fault, it would not have a place in the festivals of the gods.
Aristippus
#21. Martin's Monsanto poem holds devastating power. I heard the first public reading at the Resurgence Festival of well-being in London. It brought truth with clarity, not least with a kind of conviction and passion that is all too rare
Tony Juniper
#22. Festivals are a time to play the songs people know and are looking forward to hearing.
Scott Hutchison
#23. When it's a folk festival, there's more of an intention on the song and connecting with people.
Jenny O.
#24. I began writing early - very, very early ... I was already writing short stories for the radio and selling poems to poetry and art festivals; I was involved in school plays; I wrote essays, so there was no definite moment when I said, 'Now I'm a writer.' I've always been a writer.
Wole Soyinka
#25. Without cruelty there is no festival: thus the longest and most ancient part of human history teaches and in punishment there is so much that is festive!
Friedrich Nietzsche
#26. Long weekends at festivals, short weeks at home, all summer long: now that is surely preferable to the immense cost and headache of the nuclear family holiday in the sun?
Tom Hodgkinson
#27. As the future ripens in the past, so the past rots in the future
a terrible festival of dead leaves.
Anna Akhmatova
#28. When playing big festivals, I tend to play big, over the top techno tracks, like hands in the air songs that make sense being played in front of 30,000 people. I steer away from subtlety in the interests of big bombastic dance music.
Moby
#29. Some bosses are so greedy (for themselves only) they forget underlings are not thirteenth-century peasants who can be satisfied with a glass of mead and three festivals a year.
Helen Gurley Brown
#30. The really cool thing about festivals is that you're getting to play in front of a whole lot of people who have never heard of us before. That's exciting. At the same time, it's a little bit of a challenge to capture the attention of people who have already seen a lot of bands.
Josh Dun
#31. I think people expect mud at festivals, I think you'd be asking for your money back if you didn't get it.
Peter Hook
#32. At comedy festivals, we always get grouped with other musical comedians, so you can get to know them and see what everyone is doing. it's really fun and awesome that we're the only girls, because we can tackle issues that guys can't sing about.
Kate Micucci
#33. Teller and I worked Renaissance Festivals and street performing - actually more real, no kidding around, Philadelphia street performing than we did Renaissance Festivals.
Penn Jillette
#34. I haven't played EDC since 2011. Normally, my sound fits a little bit better in mixed festivals.
Skrillex
#35. Sundance felt like a natural fit. I love coming here, and I do think that this festival suits my films rather than most of the festivals I've been to. I'm not going to Cannes, you know.
Taika Waititi
#36. I've done festivals in the past where I'd be a guest, it was like, Wow, maybe someday I could play Town Hall - but that'll be a long way off. So it's very exciting.
John Mulaney
#37. But there's more than just solving the how-to problems. I've often said that if we're going to have a real rural renaissance, I'd just take the solving of the how-to problems for granted. The first thing I'd provide would be festivals.
Ralph Borsodi
#39. Festivals cause diseases, since they lighten cares but increase gluttony.
Apollonius Of Tyana
#40. Festivals promote diversity, they bring neighbors into dialogue, they increase creativity, they offer opportunities for civic pride, they improve our general psychological well-being. In short, they make cities better places to live.
David Binder
#41. Festivals become a family because you start seeing the same people.
Philipp Wolter
#43. But an innovation, to grow organically from within, has to be based on an intact tradition, so our idea is to bring together musicians who represent all these traditions, in workshops, festivals, and concerts, to see how we can connect with each other in music.
Yo-Yo Ma
#44. Tyrone, I think they're taking to festivals. I don't know which festivals it will be at. It's like a buddy picture. It's a couple of guys driving across the country and they get to a small town and they hit a guy. The guy turns out to be a drug smuggler.
Ethan Suplee
#45. For me, my taste is all over the place, so the festival is the perfect match for me because I can hit, again, Against Me! and SZA, all those different genres and the experience is awesome.
Jennifer Abbott
#46. Remember when movies were just good or bad, before auteurs, film festivals, and guys from USC who were the first to shoot underwater?
Mort Sahl
#47. I started with commercials - for shampoo, pancakes, insurance, Volvo. I did a Lux soap commercial with Sarah Jessica Parker. And I got a role in an indie film called 'Satellite' that did well in festivals.
Stephanie Szostak
#48. Obviously there is stuff that I wouldn't play in a club that I play at festivals, and vice-versa, but my sets are still dominated largely by my own music. I think that's what makes me stand out a bit. My music is also festival- and club-friendly, so it generally works out well.
Avicii
#49. Playing to bigger audiences at festivals got me in the mindset of writing music that I would sing to a crowd.
Caroline Polachek
#50. The academic area of new music or modern music festivals is not something which attracts me at all.
Gavin Bryars
#51. Unlike with any other art form, filmmakers have this unique web of festivals. There are hundreds. It is a democratic system in which you submit films, and if they are good enough, they play. The only barrier to entry is the submission fee.
Jason Reitman
#52. He was deader than a shrunken head at a Hackey Sack festival.
Scott Adams
#53. The moon has become a dancer
at this festival of LOVE.
Rumi
#55. Village reform is not merely cleaning the roads, constructing schools and worshipping monasteries. It is not mere celebration of festivals.
Periyar E.V. Ramasamy
#56. It feels so good to be able to be part of an action flick like 'The Raid' and to read the rave reviews in a number of film festivals.
Joe Taslim
#57. Spring and summer in Pittsburgh mean outdoor festivals.
Bill Dedman
#58. You feel like half of your life is a vacation when you go to these Barcelona music festivals and have all day to sound check or go to the pool.
Hamilton Leithauser
#59. The Internet right now is another way to get exposure. You depend on that because they give you press, and if it's successful it gets into a lot of festivals.
Philipp Wolter
#60. When you go to a film festival as an audience member, it's so much fun. But when you bring your own film there, you carry so much stress and excitement.
Mora Stephens
#61. I'm Indian-American and I think that when I think of myself as being culturally Indian, it had so much to do with when I lived with my parents and was a kid because they would take me to the Diwali festivals. They would take me to the temple, and they would teach me about all the different holidays.
Mindy Kaling
#62. Life is a happy thing, a festival to be enjoyed rather than a drudgery to be endured.
Luci Swindoll
#63. Truth is, generally I like film festivals; somewhere at some level there's an exchange of ideas.
Willem Dafoe
#64. I'm involved with a baroque opera company here in Italy. I write some of their booklet material, comments on operas. I also write for some baroque opera festivals because this music is my real passion.
Donna Leon
#65. The whole aspect of cinema and film festivals should be a moment to come together and celebrate art and humanity. It would be a shame if there was such a divide.
Keanu Reeves
#66. I'm a reporter," Rachel said. "I write about the arts, festivals, new projects in the city. What I'm not is some kind of psychic astral traveler! How did I get here? Planning a trip to another dimension?
G.G. Collins
#67. If you're into comedy, you will know what the show is about. We have so many comedy geeks, comedy enthusiasts, fanatical people who go to comedy festivals and follow comedians, and really treat it like rock 'n' roll - which it can be, but more like the geeky rock 'n' roll.
Rhys Darby
#68. A lot of festivals can be a jumble of electronic music and rock and roll, and everything's all mixed up - some things are more performance art or light shows or dance parties, and then you'll have a singer-songwriter stuck in the middle to make the changeovers easier.
Jenny O.
#69. I think people ease into this careerist professionalism, so if you're a writer it's your job to manufacture books as opposed to writing them and to go to festivals and spend your life emotionally invested in reviews or the awards. You have to shrink your universe in a way. To me, it's the opposite.
Arundhati Roy
#70. My daughter Cosma is a very popular actress in Germany. She also organizes these wonderful open-air parties. She has a wonderful teacher, she's very smart. And I sometimes perform at her festivals.
Nina Hagen
#71. Usually when festivals are really huge it's kind of weird. It's totally fun for me and my band to play in front of a crowd that doesn't necessarily know who we are, but festivals get pretty impersonal when they get super large.
Mac DeMarco
#72. If you go to a film festival and watch a bunch of features and then watch a bunch of shorts, you will almost always find that the shorts are where people are taking more risks and pushing more boundaries ... simply because they have much less to lose.
Don Hertzfeldt
#73. Festivals are fun for kids, fun for parents and offer a welcome break from the stresses of the nuclear family. The sheer quantities of people make life easier: loads of adults for the adults to talk to and loads of kids for the kids to play with.
Tom Hodgkinson
#74. I want to be safe in the knowledge that I can tour and play festivals for a long time. The main thing is that I want a good reputation as a live performer. If I have that, I'd be so happy.
Ellie Goulding
#75. My favourite two festivals have always been the Big Day Out and Summersonic in Japan. The Big Day Out is a little more fun because it lasts longer. It's like an abbreviated version of the Warped tour because you get to play with the same people every day, which is really fun.
Gerard Way
#76. I've been to two festivals in my life, and I've never been to Toronto. I haven't really been making festival movies. This is new territory for me.
Joss Whedon
#77. My work as a Meridian Psychotherapist and Clinical Hypnotherapist has taught me that people often feel guilty about the way they feel or think and many do not realise that seasonal changes can have a profound effect on the psyche.
Carole Carlton
#78. The quality and success of Disney was actually bad for us animators because everyone on the planet thought that animation was only for kids and only in a certain domain. The big film festivals never thought much about animated films.
Michel Ocelot
#79. I know that at literary festivals I'm speaking mostly to middle-class women, who frequently vote in a way that is contrary to how I'd like them to vote.
Elliot Perlman
#80. It's great to meet people in a setting where it's really conducive to hanging out and having
fun. Most film festivals are really low-stress, and good times to hang out with buddies and talk about what you're working on and come up with new ideas.
Joe Swanberg
#81. It's going to be a combination Scopes trial, revolution in the streets, Woodstock Festival and People's Park, all rolled into one.
Abbie Hoffman
#82. There's a bit less elbow room and latitude to take it somewhere else, at least at festivals. In the club you can do whatever you want but at festivals, especially Ultra, nowadays the crowd wants to hear our songs.
A-Trak
#83. The reality is that we have all these awards and all these festivals that give out awards, so you sort of go, 'okay, well, people liked the film, and I think it's a good film, and it's up for an award - well, I guess it should win the award then.'
Guy Pearce
#84. Splashing about in mud in the cold is not my thing. I made an attempt to go to the Isle Of Wight Festival in 1969 when Bob Dylan was playing, but we never made it. We hired a boat from Lymington, but got lost, and by the time we got there the music was over. I wasn't too sad, to be honest.
Tony Blackburn
#85. On an average, we celebrate 4-5 festivals per month. There are the major ones like Christmas and Diwali and then there are minor ones like whatsitsname-get-drunk-and-dance-in-front-of-temple-near-bomanahalli festival.
Rachna Singh
#86. When I was 13 or 14, I took seven months off from touring. I did a lot of weekend gigs in Louisiana. We have fairs and festivals every weekend. But I took seven months off. That's when I really started digging deep. I wrote a couple songs that year that I still play every now and then for people.
Hunter Hayes
#87. European festivals area lot bigger than American ones, but I like the travelling festivals, it's the same production every day and the bands get used to the stage set up and by the third or fourth show of the tour they're putting on a better show than if they just played one day.
Tim Lambesis
#88. Christmas Day is the festival of optimism.
Helen Keller
#89. Places of genius challenge us. They are difficult. They do not earn their place in history with ethnic restaurants or street festivals, but by provoking us, making demands of us. Crazy, unrealistic, beautiful demands.
Eric Weiner
#90. American audiences don't react in the same way as European ones to African music because, I think, Europeans listen to this music through all the festivals that exist here.
Rokia Traore
#91. To get noticed, I had to take my films in a space which was much more democratic in terms of cinema - the international film festivals.
Anurag Kashyap
#92. I stopped my iTunes festival set because someone fainted at the front. It felt like the right thing to do at the time but maybe I was being too sensitive.
Rae Morris
#93. I think people probably lie about not reading their own reviews. I don't think that's true - I've been to a lot of music festivals and hung out backstage, especially in the past couple of years, and I see all these bands reading about themselves in newspapers. So I don't think that's true.
Lily Allen
#94. I like that conventions want me to appear and festivals want me to come speak because they like the climate I attract. It's a good feeling.
Adam Green
#95. Usually when I take my films to festivals, I feel incredibly anxious about them. I wonder how it will be received, how the audience will react. I feel deeply responsible for them.
Abbas Kiarostami
#96. I have a lot of tics and phobias. I hate to travel. I hate to go to festivals. I hate it when somebody gets close behind me. I'm scared of the darkness. I hate open doors.
Ingmar Bergman
#97. That was very close to getting killed. Usually at pop festivals we have people jumping on stage.
Alice Cooper
#98. My school is very good and quite understanding and know I have to take time off for interviews or writers' festivals.
Alexandra Adornetto
#99. Festivals are always fun. I went to a lot when I was younger and had money to go to them. I like playing at festivals. They're always kind of like a big, crazy circus.
Courtney Barnett
#100. Life is a festival only to the wise. Seen from the nook and chimneyside of prudence, it wears a ragged and dangerous front.
Ralph Waldo Emerson
