Quotes from Leon Russell

I've always sort of been at odds with radio programmers.

When I was in grade school, I had a little duet act with a guy who was a beautiful singer, and somebody recorded it on a wire machine. They played it back for us, and I went, 'I hear Donald, but what is that other ugly voice?' It turned out to be me, of course.

I wish I had gone into industrial plumbing. That's a joke.

The doctor who pulled me out at birth damaged my second and third vertebrae. But without those tugs, I probably would have been a regular guy selling insurance in Texas or something.

I remember reading 'Catcher in the Rye,' but I don't think I got it.

I was playing with George Harrison one time, and George loves takes. This song was up to Take 160. I said, 'George, do you want me to play the same thing or 160 different things?' It drove me crazy because, in general, I'm ready to play my part.

I often haven't heard the music since I've recorded it. I don't listen to it. When I do hear it, like at someone's house, I'll listen. I'm probably the most pleased with the stuff I did with New Grass Revival.

It's kind of depressing to make a lot of records and not get the kind of response they deserve.

I'm just concerned with going about my business and making the records I want to make.

I make records all the time. But making records is not quite the same as getting them to the audience.

I didn't start out to become famous, so when it disappeared, I thought, well, that happens sometimes.

I've always felt I struck out with Doris Day. Her son, Terry Melcher, was a producer I worked for at Columbia, and one day, he asked me to go to her house to play piano on a song she was doing. So I get there, and she has about 30 dogs running around the place - turns out she's a dog rescuer.

I love you in a place where there's no space or time I love you for my life 'cause you're a friend of mine

I have a certain amount of difficulty dealing with too much limelight.

I'm almost totally politically inactive.

The first canon of my religion is that you shouldn't try to convince anybody to believe like you do.

When I say I don't get involved in politics, I merely mean that I don't talk to reporters about it.

I scarcely talk to reporters at all.

I used to write on pads with a pen but had trouble reading the words the next day. Years later, Bob Dylan taught me to just write and write on a laptop computer. Then I'd print that out. When it was time to write a song, I'd go through the pages and sing melodies to words that moved me.

Songwriting was very tough for me... I would go in and sit and hope for inspiration to come, and it was rarely forthcoming.

Apparently I was a Billboard top touring act of 1973, but nobody told me.

Sometimes one misses the sign posts as you're going down the road. They aren't as obvious as they become when you get to the end of the road, so to speak.

My hobby is silence.

I really am serious abut catfish farming. I'm very interested in aquaculture.