Quotes About Artists

I'm a huge Lauryn Hill and Erykah Badu fan, so working with those two in any capacity would be a dream.

I love Lauryn Hill, Tracy Chapman, Fiona Apple. People like that. People you can really connect to on the most basic human level.

When I started singing, I was covering Lauryn Hill, Brandy, and all the girl groups of the '90s. It's just what I would listen to and what I was singing when anybody asked me to sing for them.

I don't know many artists who've come out of Beverly Hills, y'know? You need that struggle.

Art is collaboration: we are artists all over the world. I believe that people are always going to watch Hindi films... that's never going to die, but I think it's amazing that collaborations like that are happening.

I think it's important for artists to work together. It's great for fans to see, like, Ludacris came out to our show in Atlanta and kinda made a surprise appearance there, it shows a mutual respect for what each other does.

The only thing the Pop Artists had in common is that we all had been commercial artists in some manner. Lichtenstein was a draftsman; I was a billboard painter, but we didn't work together. I didn't meet Andy Warhol until 1964.

Lately I've been a workaholic. I'm in the studio all the time and I've helped to produce a couple of artists.

It feels like my job is to support people. I support great artists. When I worked with a symphony, I sat in the third chair, not the first chair.

My taste for rappers is very high. I've only worked with, like, Pac and Jay-Z and Scarface.

RZA is one of the most unique individuals and rap artists that I have worked with.

Circus is what real life should be like. It's sincerity, feeling, emotions. All real. There are no lies in circus. There are artists working together to give a smile. It's a world where people help one another. It's the only show where a family, everyone from children to their grandmothers, can sit together and all be entertained by the same thing.

Hollywood is a special place; a place filled with creative geniuses - actors, screenwriters, directors, sound engineers, computer graphics specialists, lighting experts and so on. Working together, great art happens. But in the end, all artists depend on diverse audiences who can enjoy, be inspired by and support their work.

I love writing books, but it's a solitary experience. When I'm on a film set, I'm with a bunch of other artists working together to make one thing.

Rihanna is always on my playlist. I think she pumps you up and gets the day going. I also love - and I know this doesn't sound like a workout album - the Lumineers, lately, and Taylor Swift.

Archimedes was my ideal. I admired the works of artists, but to my mind, they were only shadows and semblances. The inventor, I thought, gives to the world creations which are palpable, which live and work.

You know, there are artists who are 35 and up that still make rap and that still works for them. I don't know if I want to be that guy.

Art fairs bring attention to up and coming artists and some amazing new works. They are a way to connect everyone with what's happening at the cutting edge of art, both new and historic.

When I did musicals in London a number of years ago, I was in a workshop scenario for a year or more with 'Bombay Dreams.'

When I first started acting, I was actually working with the National Youth Theatre in London doing anti-knife crime workshops, so I was listening to a lot of music that was around us all the time, around the guys I was working with, and the kids - lots of young grime artists from London.

Brazil is a country I hold very dearly. I've got followers there who I've been interacting with for years, as well as fellow artists like Ivete Sangalo, and it also has huge figures like Pele. I'd love to go to that World Cup - I'm not sure in what capacity, but I'll definitely be there. I know that nobody wants to miss it, least of all me.

I listen to music mostly in the evening. I've come to love what is called world music, like the Zimbabwean Oliver Mtukudzi and the Colombian singer Marta Gomez. I also love the Irish folk singer Mary Black. Other favorites include Chet Baker, Eva Cassidy, and Billie Holiday.

Some artists will tell you that's all they want to do is write their own music, and that's great, but George Strait, Kenny Chesney, Tim McGraw, Garth Brooks, they didn't write everything they recorded, and they've had major, major careers. I think it's all about the best song.

Dave Matthews, Tim McGraw, U2, The Rolling Stones - there are a lot of artists selling out stadiums around the world that we work with regularly. And end up making most of our money with those artists.