Top 101 Quotes & Sayings by Kurt Elling

Of course we all know when music's too much in the head, and we define our greatest players by the way they are able to communicate directly from their emotional selves.

It must be a hellish thing to know what's possible in music, to be hearing things all the time and not have an appropriate outlet for them.

I spend upwards of 200 nights a year on the road.

We live in a society where it's cool to be criminal.

Part of my joy as a singer is to give gifts to people, and one way I try to connect to them is to add something in French or German or whatever.

You don't know what bravery is until you overcome fear.

In New York, the drummers rush for a reason - because there's so much energy crackling through everything in that city and so many collisions at a highly accelerated rate.

It helps me to learn things in different languages, even if it's just phonetically, and to make myself vulnerable to other audiences by trying to reflect back to them the genius of their own cultures, and to do that, oftentimes, in new jazz settings, new arrangements. It's a way to show respect.

I know how hard it's been for me to get my thing out there.

If you're going to be transparent, you're going to have to let the music come that wants to come.

Why limit yourself to one discipline or field of study?

You don't just let a guy drop off the earth and not come together with everybody who knew him and loved him and respected him. You try to do it the right way.

The singer is always an ambassador of music.

It's true that I'm not known as a crooner or balladeer. I'm known for a more crusading or quixotic temperament.

It's easy to get tired of religious fundamentalists. They're such a bore. They have no sense of mystery. It's a drag, man.

I haven't been afraid of John Coltrane or Miles Davis or Bill Evans or Wayne Shorter or Herbie Hancock. Why would I be afraid of the Beatles?

I want to be the jazz singer.

I don't want to take it easy.

The idea is to be unrestrained by categories.

That's the thing: There are so many art songs in jazz. It's a much more rich experience for the singer than people think.

Out in L.A., things relax even further than they do in Chicago. There's such a looseness to it, and there's a potentially refreshing advantage to that.

My strength is to communicate with an audience and to know what jazz singing is capable of.

I remember seeing Tony Bennett on television. He was the only guy in the orchestra who was wearing a white tux, and I thought, 'That would be good. To be the only man on stage in a white jacket.'

Music is a physical expression that has a physical impact upon the listener. Sound travels in waves through the air. This is not abstract. This is scientific fact. And it makes physical contact with the eardrum... and with the heart... and with the rest of the body.

Sometimes people have this notion that improvisation is simply intuitive leaping into the unknown.

I couldn't do what I do without the encouragement and influence of the musicians I played with in Chicago.

We all know that jazz demands a cultivation of the mind.

I listened to a lot of King Crimson back in the day.

I hope that I'm also maturing emotionally as a human being as things go on.

I travel all the time. And as I go around the world, I try to learn a little something and not just take up all the available air.

The musicians in Chicago gave me my vocation, but New York calls to a jazz musician, for sure. You want to test your mettle.

It's a lovely thing to have people in any circumstance appreciate your work.

A lot of the commercial world wants to bank in on the cachet that jazz brings.

I really thought I was gonna have a straight gig. But these jazz musicians put their arms around me time and again and said, 'Hey, young fella, you're one of us. Come with us.' That's a big deal when you're young and looking for your way in the world.

Man, I just feel so fortunate to be a jazz musician at all. I have a hard time thinking of it any other way. It's such a fulfilling vocation. I love it.

'Man in the Air' was an experience in exercise.

I've tried to learn as much as I can about the great jazz singers to understand what makes them important, vital artists, but there is always something more to learn.

Each of the CDs prior to 'Flirting With Twilight' were more like roller-coaster rides.

I was very lucky that more experienced musicians allowed me to caterwaul until I figured out what it was really about.

My intellect was quickened at divinity school, and my abilities to discern were strengthened, and that's always valuable.

There is an actor's responsibility in presenting the emotional content of the lyrics to an audience. But whether you do that in a straightforward fashion or an ironic fashion or a blase fashion is all about opportunities, and singers are missing opportunities as artists if they don't pay attention to the lyric.

There are incredible musicians around the world.

There's a wide spectrum of possibilities in how to deliver a song.

When improvisation is properly applied, it is compositional thinking, sped way up.

I'm a jazz musician, and I really wanted to not miss an opportunity to have the full connection to jazz.

You don't want to make records so you can win a Grammy. You make records because you want to be a musician.

You work very hard on the lyrics. Getting them to fit the contours of improvised melodies.

People want to have access to jazz because it has a vibe that's very strong.

My goal is to be really incredible by the time I'm 70.

I've got more low notes than I had when I started.

I think my intention was there, and my love for the music was apparent. And there are very few singers who get up and desire to take the kinds of risks that jazz musicians routinely need to be taking.

I try to sleep as much as I can. I drink a lot of water. I practice consistently and just try to be ready for the gig.

Chicago has a burly, action-oriented but still self-assured and relaxed confidence to its stride. The city has a lot of wide-open space and all the possibilities that suggests. There's a lot of horizontal grandeur here.

There's a spiritual complement to any attempt at transposing a commitment to humanity through music or art.

You can start from any source material, and you can approach it with a jazz ear, and then it will become a jazz moment.

You learn as much as you can from the people that you work with. That's why you want to surround yourself with the heaviest people that you can possibly get to.

I'd been studying philosophy at the University of Chicago. I hadn't been doing well, because I was sitting in with jazz musicians at night - it's hard to read Heidegger, but it's especially hard if you're half asleep.

I'm one of the culprits who keeps turning stuff around, shaking up original tunes and trying to stand the canon on its ear. But sometimes, you just need to sing the song.

As improvisers, we're acting as composers in front of people.

A lot of people are put off by the idea of scat singing. Either that or it's something to be made fun of.