Quotes About What Music Is

#1. I love what I do: there is no pressure. The music doesn't like pressure.

Burning Spear

#2. There's part of me that feels a privilege not to do music, but to do what everybody should be allowed to do, which is to do what you're driven to do.

Greg Saunier

#3. Telescopes and bathyscapes and sonar probes of Scottish lakes, Tacoma Narrows bridge collapse explained with abstract phase-space maps, some x-ray slides, a music score, Minard's Napoleonic war: the most exciting new frontier is charting what's already here.

Randall Munroe

#4. Music, first of all, is completely about abstraction, which is exactly what architecture is not. In a way, it has been incredibly constructive to know what true abstraction is. So you don't fall into the trap of thinking that what you do is abstract.

Rafael Vinoly

#5. What is music for? It's to make you feel good.

Sebastian Bach

#6. But I love to write music. What I would love to do is give some of the songs I write to someone like Taylor Swift because I feel like she could sing them.

Keegan Allen

#7. I am of the opinion that the appreciation and the desire for what is good takes more study and insight than does the understanding and test for the best music and art.

Laurance Rockefeller

#8. The holy trifecta of directing and filmmaking is character emotion, camera movement and music. When you hit those three, that's magical. That's what I'm trying to do.

David O. Russell

#9. Music, I think, is best when it honestly explores personal demons, and it stirs around in the silt of the psyche to find out what's really there.

Tom Morello

#10. Music is a reflection of who you are, and if those things that you mentioned are what your music is all about, then I guess that's who you are.

Lil' Wayne

#11. Irving Berlin said, "Popular music is popular because a lot of people like it." That doesn't mean it's good or bad - that's the equivalent of arguing the merits of hotdogs versus hamburgers. What the hell difference does it make?

Lester Bangs

#12. I'd never been around a capella or really knew much about it. I feel like I know a lot about music, but what I didn't anticipate is that when every actor has to sing a different part and then do all their choreography on the same beat or on the same word, it's really hard.

Jason Moore

#13. I wish the music business was a much easier thing, but you know what? Nothing easy is worth anything. So it is what it is. There comes a time when things can work out and everybody can be happy. And that's what it's all about in the end - everybody being happy and working it out.

Nas

#14. I don't think anyone can measure up to what my father had achieved. I'm just happy to at least play some of his music, but he is really the one who was the pioneer, the one who started all this. He's really The King.

Natalie Cole

#15. Sound is what drives my solos, not verbal concepts, I never think 'I'm going to use a Lydian Dominant scale and then go up a half-step', even though that might be exactly what I end up doing ...

John Scofield

#16. I'm a very optimistic person. I have the chance to listen to so much phenomenal music. Connecting with social networking to create music is a progression of what electronic music does anyway - it connects people.

Paul Van Dyk

#17. What I'm doing is basically the same as Bob Dylan did with folk songs and Woody Guthrie songs, the same as folk music's always done. I'm not going to sing about ploughing, but I'll write a song that sounds like it should be about ploughing.

Justin Townes Earle

#18. I'm an anxious person. What I like best is to smoke cigarettes and listen to music. A perfect day for me is a day with coffee, cigarettes, and music, to quote Jim Jarmusch.

Claire Denis

#19. There's a basic rule which runs through all kinds of music, kind of an unwritten rule. I don't know what it is. But I've got it.

Ron Wood

#20. When I use weed creatively, I'm much better at drawing or making something or playing music. But what I do for a living is mostly performing as an actor or writing, and for those things I need to have my faculties sharp.

Nick Offerman

#21. If Barbra Steisand wants to make a picture called 'My Pink Fingernail,' the studios will go, 'Gee, Barbra, what a wonderful idea! Money is no object! Take two years in preproduction and write the music, and you'll direct.'

Mickey Rooney

#22. I suppose my approach to religion is like my approach to music - I take what I want and leave the rest.

Lana Del Rey

#23. As a director, the biggest job is to discern the imperfections in emotional tone and then view it in the global picture of what you're trying to do, if that makes sense. It's a rhythm, like music is a rhythm or composition and art is a rhythm. Dialogue is a rhythm as well.

Robert Stromberg

#24. It just sort of happened. I wrote like what I'd always read and what was in the movies ... I'm sure popular music is supposed to be like this.

Warren Zevon

#25. People hate to describe their music. What we have come to call it is "beat up your mom" music. As far as describing what it sounds like, I guess you'd have to listen.

Marilyn Manson

#26. I'm really in touch with my fans. Through their emails, letters and stories is how I decide what music I'm going to perform.

Jenni Rivera

#27. What I like about electronic music is you don't really need to be that learned or educated in any particular context. You can just make sound, noise even, whatever it may be.

Justin Broadrick

#28. We wanted to establish a new fan base over here. And second, we wanted to challenge ourselves. We wanted to bring what is ostensibly new music to fresh ears and see what lights them up.

Bob Weir

#29. I want to be someone who is respected and not just in terms of my music. I want to be respected in terms of the way that I treat people ... Music is my creative outlet in terms of expressing what is important to me; what has importance, what has a value. And I wanna be respected for that.

Macklemore

#30. Dick Clark was a really great influence in my career; he helped me a lot with his whole organization, and they were awesome to me at all different points - but one thing that I really disagreed with him on was when he said that what I do, pop music, is a disposable art form.

Cyndi Lauper

#31. Well, we play Country music; we're just not sure what country it is.

Jerry Jeff Walker

#32. The "real stuff" is what he calls the music that is piped in through the speaker in the machine. The music that comes from inside my head is not considered real.

Francisco X Stork

#33. It's very strange what happens when I start working for a film. In my life I've done a lot of stuff - I did a lot of dance music, a lot of TV shows and lots of different types of films - and every time it is a new experience.

Claudio Simonetti

#34. Music to me is life. It's what gets me going.

Apolo Ohno

#35. Classical music is an unbroken, living tradition that goes back over 1,000 years, and every one of those years has had something unique and powerful to say to us about what it's like to be alive.

Michael Tilson Thomas

#36. The thing that pleases me the most about it is that young people like it. It's given kids from 6 to 16 an alternate view of music to what's been available for the past 20 years.

George Harrison

#37. It's weird because music is this thing that you love doing, and it comes completely from a place of creativity, and then that transfers into having to manage a business and make decisions and figure out what is the best route to go in terms of getting your product to as many people as possible.

Macklemore

#38. It is a well known fact that most artists produce their best work early in their career. They may refine what they do but you usually get the measure of what they are about on their first outing.

Bill Drummond

#39. I've never believed in cheapening music by going according to what some people think is public taste.

Les Baxter

#40. Music is an emotional experience, and that is what imprints itself on the soul. And I think for me, any great art is art which communicates human emotion.

Greg Lake

#41. I think that's what's really beautiful about music, that it is little pieces of your heart and soul.

Darren Hayes

#42. What's funny for me is that I made a lot of the music I make with intentions of it being a song you listen to, to chill out.

Flume

#43. The idea that music is art has been something we advocated for years. And yet it doesn't receive the same treatment as art in the sense of the value of what it is, especially nowadays when it's been devalued and diminished to almost the point that it has to be given away for free.

RZA

#44. Music has always been there for me and is what's helped me through everything. It's like my solace.

Sharleen Spiteri

#45. What I like about pop music, and why I'm still attracted to it, is that in the end it becomes our folk music.

Bono

#46. One can't deny what has happened to us in the past. The secret is to enjoy and be proud of the music we've created and the people with whom we have been linked. It's all a long chain of involvement in the world, and we are proud to be yet another link in this chain.

Graham Nash

#47. I think PSP is going to be the most successful handheld entertainment device ever. What it will do in terms of the versatility, obviously you can download music to it, and you'll be able to enjoy all your great tunes on it.

Ian Jackson

#48. What do you think happens to a composer who is sincere and loves to write and has to wait thirty years to have someone play a piece of his music?

Charles Mingus

#49. We think that this is just our world and we don't know what other people are thinking. Music actually is a phenomenal connector in that respect. It's a special language that defines certain boundaries and connects people in a particular way, a very emotional way, I have found.

Annie Lennox

#50. All those governments and this and that, these people that say they're here to help, why them say you cannot smoke the herb? Herb ... herb is a plant, you know? And when me check it, me can't find no reason. All them say is, 'it make you rebel'. Against what?

Bob Marley

#51. Music is always key to me, whether it's 'Miami Vice' or not 'Miami Vice.' It's dictated by the story, about what Crockett and Tubbs and Isabella and Trudy are doing.

Michael Mann

#52. I see everybody arguing about what the value of music should be instead of what I think the bigger conversation is, which is that music has value, it's subjective and we're moving to a new era where the audience is taking more responsibility for supporting artists at whatever level.

Amanda Palmer

#53. I think Westlife is very unique: we have a certain sound; we do our thing our way, and we don't try to change too much. I think that's what the fans love about us. We keep giving the fans what they want every year. The style of music never really changes too much.

Shane Filan

#54. Music is what I have to do, I only answer the questions so that I can do it.

Jack White

#55. I'm not a lyric writer to make statements. What I enjoy doing is making paintings with lyrics, creating colorful images. I think that's more what entertainment and music should be.

Chris Cornell

#56. The music industry is a world of smoke and mirrors: they tell you exactly what they think you want to hear. And they are bare-faced lying. I tend to stay away from that.

Kelis

#57. Blues is to jazz what yeast is to bread
without it, it's flat.

Carmen McRae

#58. My dad's intense love for art and music is what drove me to learn music

Shreya Ghoshal

#59. Music is the highest art, no question. But literature is a friendlier one. It depends on us more, bores us more quickly, can't go on if we don't, can't stop saying what it means, can't stop giving us something to forgive.

James Richardson

#60. A lot of country music is sad. I think most art comes out of poverty and hard times. It applies to music. Three chords and the truth - that's what a country song is. There is a lot of heartache in the world.

Willie Nelson

#61. A man is a success if he gets up in the morning and gets to bed at night, and in between he does what he wants to do.

Bob Dylan

#62. When I think of music, I think of music in its totality, complete. From the lowest blues to the highest symphony, you know, so what I'd like to do is exemplify each style of as many periods as I can possibly do.

Donny Hathaway

#63. I hate fame. There's this assumption that everyone wants it - that by being a musician, I've signed up for it at some point. But personally, what I signed up for is sharing my music. I've always said I'd rather have four No. 10 songs than one No. 1 hit.

Chet Faker

#64. Which is more musical, a truck passing by a factory or a truck
passing by a music school?
Are the people inside the school musical and the ones outside unmusical?
What if the ones inside can't hear very well, would that change my question?

John Cage

#65. MUSIC expressed what cannot be said and on which it is IMPOSSEBLE TO BE SILENT.

Victor Hugo

#66. I think the whole question of meaning in music is difficult enough even if you hear me playing live right now in the same room! What I mean and what you take from it may be two quite different things anyway.

Evan Parker

#67. I like to read and dream and create music that is based on the imagery of text. If you have the combination of a great book and a great filmmaker, what could be better for the composer?

Howard Shore

#68. Music is great; it all depends on what mood you're in, what you want to listen to. If it's party time, you listen to, you know, party music, if you want to dance with somebody. But then again, if it's a slow dance, you need something slow.

Tom Jones

#69. My happy place, huh? Well, yeah, I guess that's what music is for me.

Rachel Harris

#70. The music industry is not what it used to be. Being in a good band is great, and I've been lucky to be in great bands. I've done solo stuff, and that's been great. I also produce rock bands and I do co-writes, where I write with different singers in bands and songwriters.

James Iha

#71. Music television is all about the media-oriented version of what it is to be a rock star; it's not about what Bob Dylan or Jimi Hendrix were about - which included great images, sure, but they had spiritual and political and revolutionary content, too.

Patti Smith

#72. What I know is my music gets blamed for school shootings.

Marilyn Manson

#73. I'm not afraid of being thought of as someone who is associated with film music. Why not? If it's a good song, what does it matter?

Bryan Adams

#74. I love Judy Garland, I love Doris Day, I love Marilyn Monroe. I love everything that comes from that era. The music is just beautiful and powerful - and simple. That's what makes it so great.

Emmy Rossum

#75. Your personal history is a part of what happens with your hands and your head as you play music.

Dave Grohl

#76. When you look at what we spend on entertainment, whether it's on CDs, music, DVDs, there is so much money invested in that, people want to know a little more about the stars they're paying to see or hear.

Mary Hart

#77. In my life right now, in my music, and just overall I feel like I'm winning. It doesn't matter what this person is saying or what the charts are saying or what award shows are saying, the public opinion doesn't matter. I feel like I'm winning in my spirit.

Brandy Norwood

#78. My music appeals in America. There is less of the purist criticism I get here. And to be a hit in the U.S ... what singer doesn't have that dream?

Katherine Jenkins

#79. Make it, not make it? What's the difference? Music is a language, it's a dance of life, and it can be a part of your life without being something that earns.

Tina Weymouth

#80. Music is very similar to comedy: It's all about texture, timing, context, vocabulary, performance. When someone's onstage doing a solo, essentially it's the same thing as what a comedian does. They're in the moment. They're listening.

Reggie Watts

#81. In Africa, music is for everything, Music was originally used for community. That was what music was for.

Emmanuel Jal

#82. I try not to listen to other music. I have to keep my mind open for what's coming in as a songwriter. If I go into the gas station and pay for gas, whatever song was playing when I was in there is in my head for the next few days and I can't change the channel.

Mark Farner

#83. All he wants to do is practice and that's all he does, all day long. That's what it takes if you want to change the face of music. You've gotta be committed to it.

Jimmy Chamberlin

#84. It's not the art, it's the heart. What [God] reads during our worship is the inner attitude. Worship is spiritual; it's organic; it's relational.

LaMar Boschman

#85. We talk a lot on 'Biggest Loser' about how fitness is a natural antidepressant, how it burns off stress. What I like about running is that it gives me time alone. I'm always busy, with people at work, with my kids. I love getting out for a run by myself and just listening to my music.

Alison Sweeney

#86. Pop music is like fast food. It's always available quickly and might even taste good while you're eating it...but eventually you're going to shit it out and see it for what it really is--all the packaging in the world can't cover up the fact that it's excrement.

Marcus Eder

#87. I always remain optimistic. There are three levels of music production: the majors, indies, and what I call "inties," music distributed via the Internet. The Internet is one area that I have used pretty effectively to break free of corporate control.

Chuck D

#88. In your works, you have realized what I, albeit in uncertain form, have so greatly longed for in music. The independent progress through their own destinies, the independent life of the individual voices in your compositions is exactly what I am trying to find in my paintings.

Wassily Kandinsky

#89. I do feel like no matter what you're doing, whether it's music or writing a play or a poem or drawing a picture or painting something, that you're speaking to what is it you want to express, what is it you want to see.

J.J. Abrams

#90. What I believe
is that life
is music and fabulous foliage,
but it's also cancer and wars.
That's just how it is.
Maybe God could do better.
But shit, so could we.

Lisa Schroeder

#91. The whole point of the game is not to stick with one thing, because when that one thing ends, then what are you going to do? For me, I have movies, '106 & Park,' music, and other things to fall back on.

Bow Wow

#92. A man in Mali told me that there are seven senses. Everyone has five, some can use their sixth. But not everyone has the seventh. It is the power to heal with music, calm with color, to soothe the sick soul with harmony. He told me that I have this gift, and I know what I have to do with it.

Marie Daulne

#93. It is an awesome tragedy in this life that, when asking what a person is and they reply doctor or lawyer or engineer, we don't say Well thats a nice little hobby, but why don't you take up writing or painting or music?

D.A. Botta

#94. To me, that's what music is: creating a mood, and taking the listener to the place that you're going.

Paul Rodgers

#95. A musician must make music, an artist must paint, a poet must write, if he is to be ultimately at peace with himself. What a man can be, he must be

Abraham H. Maslow

#96. What a way to learn great theology! That's what comes to mind whenever I sing one of those old hymns. "And Can It Be" is like putting the doctrine of salvation to music. "Come Thou Fount of Every Blessing" is a melodic lesson in grace. No wonder good hymns make for strong faith!

Joni Eareckson Tada

#97. No one understands another's grief, no one understands another's joy ... My music is the product of my talent and my misery. And that which I have written in my greatest distress is what the world seems to like best.

Franz Schubert

#98. Music criticism should be to musicians what ornithology is to the birds.

Yuja Wang

#99. I think the hymns give us a glimpse of the generations before us, and what was important to them at the time. Even though they are usually singing similiar messages that are in today's music, it is good to be reminded that the message of Christ is just as much relevant today as it was then.

Bart Millard

#100. What music "means" is almost completely dependent on the people who sell it and the people who buy it, not the people who make it. Our greatest artists are the ones who understand how they can be interesting and unique within those limitations.

Chuck Klosterman