A Quote by Yuna

I really like the idea of modesty. By the time I got into music, I was already wearing the scarf all the time, and it's really personal to me, my Muslim beliefs, so I decided to keep it and find a way to work around it. I don't see it as a restriction or limitation - I can still be me and get into music and be an entertainer.
I think I'm really part of a whole generational movement in a way. I think a lot of other people since and during this time have gotten interested in writing what we can still call experimental music. It's not commercial music. And it's really a concert music, but a concert music for our time. And wanting to find the audience, because we've discovered the audience is really there. Those became really clear with Einstein on the Beach.
Music is a spiritual expression of what's in your heart. Music as a way of getting rich is a pretty new thing, and I often wonder if the mega-bucks glitzy atmosphere is making the quality of music suffer. You have to work really hard to get around that and remember why you're in it in the first place: because you have to be. It's like an addiction. You can't go a day without picking up your guitar. To me, the only commercial goals that are really valid are, 'Boy, I wish I didn't have to go to work. I wish I could do this all the time.'
You got a lot of ladies to get through. You’re still young. First love’s the sweetest, but it doesn’t last.” “Not ever?” I ask. Grandad looks at me with a seriousness he reserves for moments when he wants me to really pay attention. “When we fall that first time, we’re not really in love with the girl. We’re in love with being in love. We’ve got no idea what she’s really about—or what she’s capable of. We’re in love with our idea of her and of who we become around her. We’re idiots.
I stumbled into soul music at a very young age. It had something that really spoke to me. Nowadays it's not only American gospel or soul music, it's whenever somebody decides to do music in a way that's honest and passionate. I got into the Motown songs. It had to do with where I come from - we don't really have that where I come from, the sense of mystery and the pain. Sweden has been a wealthy and happy country for some time now. I think I got really drawn to that.
I'm not conditioned to be an entertainer. An entertainer pleases others while an artist only has to please himself. The problem with that is artists are misunderstood by all. I'm not interested in the clarinet but in music. we speak our emotions into music. An artist should write for himself and not for an audience. If the audience likes it, great. If not, they can keep away. My situation is the same. Let them concentrate on my music and not on me. I like the music. I love it and live it, in fact. But for me, the business part of music just plain stinks.
Bach in general was so good with the violin. He just finds the genius way around his music on the instrument. When you think about the fact that the instrument has changed significantly since he wrote for it and his music still really works, it's brilliant. He was definitely ahead of his time. There's something so satisfying about his music. It's beautifully organized and emotional at the same time. I find it highly exciting.
There's always music sitting around, but when you're cultivating music, the idea of getting into a studio and compressing it to get something out on time can be really good.
For me, let's keep jazz as folk music. Let's not make jazz classical music. Let's keep it as street music, as people's everyday-life music. Let's see jazz musicians continue to use the materials, the tools, the spirit of the actual time that they're living in, as what they build their lives as musicians around.
The magic that you find in surf music, I think, is really timeless. You know, when I was very young, I was in a surf band. Surf music is an instrumental music that still means a lot to me, not in an nostalgic way, but as something that really gets to the heart of the guitar itself.
I have a rule with my managers that unless it's someone big time, just tell me where I'm going and I'll see who it is at the studio at the time. I don't like thinking about it, it gives me anxiety. I like to keep a clear mind; its music, just music.
If I ever really felt depressed, I would just start putting on all my old records that I played as a kid, because the whole thing that really lifted me then still lifted me during those other times. It was good medicine for me, and it still does that for me when I put something on. Isn't it wonderful that we've got all that good medicine? I think it's got to be all part of our DNA, this mass communication through music. That's what it is. It's got to be, hasn't it? Music is the one thing that has been consistently there for me. It hasn't let me down.
I decided to not be so dismissive of my music in favor of my acting. Acting has been such a consistent thing for me; a lot of times in the past, I wouldn't have had the confidence with my music to really make it a part of my schedule. I would easily push it to the side, or I would easily take up time that was needed for it. I'm not that way anymore. Now, I really want to make everything work. I want to continue to do both at the highest level that I can.
Words and music equally important. But the way to get what I'm looking for is different in each case. I have something specific I'm hoping for with the words and the music, and the way to get the words the way I like them is to take a long time, and the way to get the music I like it is to not let me or anyone else get in the way of it.
I couldn't find a way to write music with numbers and rules and schedules. So I tried to forget the academic idea of music and started to see if it was possible to do creative work, taking in all the influences I wanted to keep.
I take things very seriously, and I give myself time to come down and to ramp up, and it's an inside spiritual journey for me. I feel like acting is a way of feeling your personality, and it's really special. Special to have this kind of effect on people. You can only have that effect if you're really outside of yourself. You can't look at yourself and do what I do at the same time. I have done it that way in the past, but it doesn't really work. I can only soar within the parameters of time, and I use music analogies.
By the time I got to high school, I didn't play anything but baseball because I was on a mission. I really wanted to get a scholarship. I really wanted to focus all my time and efforts on baseball. When I got up to Florida State, God spoke to me very clearly and called me out of that and called me into music, which up until that point had just been a hobby.
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