A Quote by Yael Naim

My big influences are Joni Mitchell, and a lot of classical and Indian music, as well as Nina Simone and the personal blues and jazz of Billie Holiday. Other influences for me include Bjork, Nick Drake, and Sufjan Stevens.

Yael Naim

Quote Topics

Big Blues Classical Drake Holiday Include Indian Indian Music Influences Jazz Joni Mitchell Lot Me Mitchell Music Nick Nina Other Personal Well

Quote Author

Yael Naim
French - Musician
Born: February 6, 1978

I say that I do soul, R&B music. I have so many influences, from Billie Holiday, Nina Simone to Stevie Wonder and Prince and even Al Green and Bjork. And a lot of hip hop music has influenced me a lot - you know - De La Soul and Digital Underground and A Tribe Called Quest.

Goapele

My vocal influences are a lot of jazz singers: Billie Holiday, Julie London, they had this tenderness to their voice.

Borns

Judy Garland, Doris Day, and Gene Kelly were all big influences growing up from all of the films. I'm also a huge folk music fan - Joni Mitchell, Joan Baez, and Bob Dylan have influenced a lot of how music can inspire change in our world.

Lindsay Mendez

Basically my influences have been American influences. It's been blues, gospel, swing era music, bebop music, Broadway show music, classical music.

Horace Silver

As far as influences, I listen to a lot of people like Nina Simone and other androgynous voices, almost to make me feel like I'm not alone.

Shamir

Basically my influences have been American influences. It's been blues, gospel, swing era music, bebop music, Broadway show music, classical music. It's like making a stew. You put all these various ingredients in it. You season it with this. You put that in it. You put the other in it. You mix it all up and it comes out something neat, something that you created.

Horace Silver

I'm influenced a lot by Nina Simone, Stevie Wonder, even Paul Weller - Billie Holiday as well: People who wrote and sang songs that were reflective of their times. I quite like that. I quite admire that.

Hozier

My influences are jazz, blues, European classical music; they are rock music and pop music. So many kinds of music. World music from different countries like India and China. I think that would be a shame not to take advantage and do something... not unique, because I don't have this pretension.

Rokia Traore

When I heard Billie Holiday's voice, Nina Simone's and Ella Fitzgerald's - there was something about their voices to me that was such a different texture than what I was used to listening to at the time. Hearing those jazz voices were so different, and I think I just gravitated toward it.

Andra Day

I grew up a huge Roy Orbison fan. He had such a crazy range. And I grew up listening to old jazz, Billie Holiday, Nina Simone. I remember trying to imitate female jazz singers because I had a higher range.

Borns

I grew up listening to Beethoven and old jazz singers like Billie Holiday, Nina Simone and Anita O'Day. But those were, like, the only women I listened to - I hated women pop singers.

Sophie B. Hawkins

One day, I'd like to tackle a biopic. I grew up very influenced by Josephine Baker, Billie Holiday, and Nina Simone.

Zazie Beetz

I listen to Radio 4 and put the iPod on shuffle. I like the randomness of, say, the Stones, then something from Nina Simone, Nick Drake or Bob Dylan.

Catherine McCormack

Blues, rock, and soul are part of the music I make, but there are Indian influences, too.

Shruti Haasan

I listened to classical music. I listened to jazz. I listened to everything. And I started becoming interested in the sounds of jazz. And I went to a concert of Jazz at the Philharmonic when we lived in Omaha, Nebraska, and I saw Charlie Parker play and Billie Holiday sing and Lester Young play, and that did it. I said, 'That's what I want to do.'