Quotes About Artistry

Hindi film songs are the best of everything - whether it is lyrics, melody and talented singers.

The mindset that I have on every project I take on is, 'How do I make this interesting enough for me to want to stop and look at it?' So in that regard, what I do behind the camera, whether it's still or motion picture, is the same.

Dance is about portraying and telling a story and whether that be two males, two females, a group of guys, or a group of girls, it doesn't matter as long as the story is beautiful.

Think of the imagination as a giant stone from which we carve out new ideas. As we chip away, our new ideas become more polished and refined. But if you start by editing your imagination, you start with a tiny stone.

The true genius shudders at incompleteness - and usually prefers silence to saying something which is not everything it should be.

Singing instrumental music is most important because, while you play an instrument, you are singing through the instrument... actually, you are singing inside.

Human speech is like a cracked kettle on which we tap crude rhythms for bears to dance to, while we long to make music that will melt the stars.

Music is a kind of magical thing, and you can't make magic every time, but you try. Every once in a while it has that magic, and the audience knows that. I probably miss it more than I hit it, but I think that's what all musicians try for.

It's like, how do you continue to make records that are representative of who you are that your fans will recognize as your band, while still trying to push things forward and present new sounds for people.

What I wanted and what I visualized while composing has not always been realized.

I can recommend wearing blue mascara whilst writing. I'm telling you, it really adds something.

One of the hardest things I've encountered whilst working on 'Pippin' is the consistent irony, as a reflection from the core material of the show, within my own life.

I've been wanting to produce for some time because I want to have more creative control over the things that I do and not be victim to the whims of other people's desires.

My vocal style I haven't tried to copy from anyone. It just developed until it became the girlish whine it is today.

Sometimes something opens up in your brain as I'm writing, thinking about the song, and it's like a whirlwind. It all comes together and I could hear what I wanted the songs to sound like, I just didn't know how to express it.

I would hope it's better, but I'm actually acknowledging now that I want to explore all these levels from a whisper to a scream with this gift I've been given.

It's like these ideas, these characters, kind of bubble up inside me, and one day they're not there, and the next day they are there. They're alive, and they're whispering in my head and all that stuff, and I want to write about those things.

I play a little bit of everything. I beat on the walls. I whistle. I scream. I go outside and scream because it sounds cool when it's recorded. I play drums on a chair. I snap, clap... just anything to build the track and make it feel like I want it to.

I've always been a bit of a Jekyll and Hyde. I always feel that you should keep singles as commercial as possible so that the people can walk down the road and whistle a song. But on the other hand on albums I think you can afford to show people what you can do.

If you can whistle the melody, then the song will stick. But if you need a bunch of machines to make it sound good, you're probably not writing anything that's going to last a long time.

That's where the Black Keys and Jack White have succeeded and I've failed: They've actually convinced college kids that they're listening to hip music - but it's just blues twisted a new way - while I'm playing for the college kid's parents.

Without going outside his race, and even among the better classes with their 'white' culture and conscious American manners, but still Negro enough to be different, there is sufficient matter to furnish a black artist with a lifetime of creative work.

Overall my race hasn't been a problem. I'm a Black artist with White skin. At the end of the day you have to sing what's in your own soul.

If I were not a black artist but I was still singing, playing guitar, and singing ballads that are spiritual and cerebral, I'd be easier to market because people accept that from white female singer-songwriters faster.