Top 1200 Singer-Songwriter Quotes & Sayings - Page 5

I was chubby in high school. I used to go to my information technology class, and I would type really fast to get the lesson done quick because the teacher had a little acoustic guitar, and there was a girl I had a crush on in the class. I would take the guitar and pretend to be some great singer-songwriter, serenade her with joke songs.

I always was really confident about myself, about my voice, myself as a person, my body, all of those things, but as a songwriter - I just didn't identify as a songwriter at all.

I think Bob Dylan's a good songwriter. I think he's the best songwriter in the world probably.

I always wanted to be an artist; being a songwriter for myself was always a must but being a songwriter for others has been a bonus.

I was going to be a singer. If I hadn't been in my profession, I was going to be an Opera singer. That's from a young kid. I had all these records from all those famous Opera singers. I wanted to be an Opera singer - that was my whole thing and physical fitness got in the way, thank God.

A young female essayist saying they're influenced by Joan Didion is like a young female singer-songwriter saying they're influenced by Joni Mitchell.

I don't think people really understood what I did. And you know, in my book, 'A Helluva High Note' deals with my back story, that I was a songwriter, that I spent years trying to hone my craft and being rejected and then finally becoming a successful songwriter, record executive and publisher.

My brother sings. My brother is a singer-songwriter. His name is Parker Ainsworth. He changed his last name to his middle name.

It's not like that when you're a songwriter - songwriters aren't like pulp writers or journalists, even. You just follow the muse. It's called muse-ic. Whenever the muse decides to bestow her inspiration on the songwriter, then the song is born.

I was in bands as a singer-guitarist-songwriter until 1980-81. So, there's a bunch of stuff. A lot of the stuff is hard to come by-stuff by the Special Interest Group and the Zobo Funn Band. The Zobo Funn Band was a big Northeast cult band. We had about a billion skirmishes with the big rock industry.

You can go out and find ways to make your own record and get it out there now. If you really want to, you can be heard. Keep things simple. Learn to go out and play solo. That's a really really good thing to learn, if you're a singer-songwriter. Don't be dependent on a band because you may not always be able to afford one.

I don't really like to call myself a brand, and I don't like to think of myself as a brand. I'm a singer, a songwriter, a musician and a performer. And an actress, and all the other things that I do. When you add it all together, some might call it a brand, but that's not my focus.

My mother is a singer, still performs today; she's a jazz singer.

And Carolina will be cheering on the beautiful daughter of Magda and Shalom Singer, the new Lady America Singer!

Before I was 14, I wanted to be a singer, an actor, or a hockey player. By 15, I knew I was going to be a singer.

If you're a lead singer, then you can't afford to be sensitive. On stage, everyone looks at the lead singer, even if you don't want them to - in America, they have those massive follow spots on you all the time; it does your head in. So, if you are a lead singer and you don't toughen up, you're in the wrong job, and you have to get out.

All I've ever wanted to do is master my craft. I'm a singer, and I want to be a great singer.

It's easy for a singer to sometimes pick up on another singer's sound, but that's just copying.

you know...uh I'm a singer... pop singer... i'm white

Then it evolved into more of a ballad style singer/songwriter thing. And there was a conflict in trying to merge the two styles with the same band behind me. 'Cause the musicians that I would need to do ballad-oriented tunes would require musicians who were more into jazz.

I definitely use life experiences. For me, it's extremely hard to write about something I don't know anything about. If I've never been angry, then I can't write about being angry. We're human beings so we all have emotions. To just have that knowledge, it definitely helps me out as a singer songwriter.

Definitely. More and more I understand that it's very fine not to know where you come from. There is line in a song by Georges Brassens [French singer-songwriter]: 'Les imbciles heureux qui sont ns quelquepart.' I will never be one of the happy stupid that were born somewhere. This way of life is excellent for the imagination. It develops your paranoia. You feel paranoid when you don't understand a country, and being paranoiac is excellent for fiction.

The greatness of Mac Rebennack, alias, Dr. John, also known as John Crieux, rests on his command of the musical use of idiomatic expression. Not a technically well-endowed singer, nor a great songwriter, he leaves his mark through the discipline and control he exerts over all that he touches.

I've never wanted to be famous. That has never been a part of any dream. I do remember being little and thinking I might want to be a singer. But not a famous singer - just, like, a singer.

Growing up as a singer, and a cast member, and now as an adult, a songwriter, I get the luxury of choosing the kinds of songs that I want to sing, because I'll write, you know, hundreds of songs. Even though only 12 appear on the album. That's 12 that I've chosen to sing of my catalog.

When I was running the Troubadour, there was this transition from the classic singer/songwriter Jackson Browne types to bands like Black Flag, the Dead Kennedys, and Fear. Those are just some that come to mind. Oh, and Adam Ant! The Fear fans wanted to 'crush' the Ants. These guys hated each other.

Looking back on my whole experience, the biggest takeaway was just being proud of what you do, and knowing that it's okay to do your best even if it's not the best. That's sort of the theme. I mean, obviously I'm not the best singer, obviously I'm not the best piano player or the best songwriter, but I'm doing my best on all of 'em. Once you have all those things in place, then I think everything falls the way it should.

One of the greatest tools you have as a songwriter is anonymity. If someone knows too much about the songwriter, they don't get to insert their own characters. I don't want the audience thinking about the gay guy who wrote the song.

I'm not a jazz singer, blues singer or country singer. I'm a singer that can sing rhythm & blues, that can sing jazz, that can sing country. There's a big difference. In other words, I'm not a specialist.

Everybody wants to write a hit song, but in Nashville people want to write the best song, which was my original intention as a singer/songwriter. ... I left because I could no longer make records that sounded less and less like me. I tried to please people instead of believing in my own strength, until the only thing I could do was walk away.

It's kind of great being a group without a lead singer, because the possibilities are sky high. Odd things become the lead singer, noises become the lead singer. It actually makes the thing much more flexible.

That little Miley Cyrus... she's like a little Elvis. The kids love her because she's Hannah Montana, but what people don't realize about her is she is such a fantastic singer and songwriter. She writes songs like she's 40 years old!

My goal was to become a 'good singer' rather than a 'different singer.'

When I started playing solo 10 years ago, I had some ham-fisted idea about trying to subvert the "singer-songwriter" tag/genre, and I tried to obscure my identity into the identity of a collective or band or whatever. That's part of the reason that I used to play with backing tapes and why so much of my early stuff was so awash in tape hiss and echo noise.

I have felt for a long time that I want to return back to being a singer-songwriter for a period of time. I will go back to Broadway. But I want to make the right choices about why to go back and when I am ready to go back.

As a young singer, a record company wanted me to be a rock singer. I told them I couldn't because I didn't understand the music.

Honestly, I've been reading a lot of books on visual art. I've been reading a lot of books by Olivia Lang, I've been listening to a lot of folk and singer-songwriter music, but also a lot of electronic and really hard techno. I'm just trying to create something that pulls from everywhere and that hopefully feels unique.

I consider myself to be an inept pianist, a bad singer, and a merely competent songwriter. ... I'm probably writing music now for the same reason as I started writing songs when I was 14-to meet women. ... If you make music for the human needs you have within yourself, then you do it for all humans who need the same things. You enrich humanity with the profound expression of these feelings. ... My songs are like my kids.

I don't feel like God called me to be a Gospel singer. He didn't call me to be a Christian singer, he called me to be a country singer, and I just happen to be a Christian.

Even though I'm a pop singer, I really have more the life of a country singer.

Undeniably, I'm a country singer; I'm a country songwriter. But I feel like I make country music for people who like country music and for people who don't.

What was nice about the nineties is that it was an example of music that responded to a desire of the times. It spoke to the social conditions of the times. Women were making more money. Women were saying, "My voice counts. If we're going out on a Friday night, I don't want to see a Rambo movie. I want to go see a singer/songwriter who sings about my life".

Lisa Gerrard from Dead Can Dance is my favorite singer as a singer - so I'm really widely spread open with music choices.

What happened was, I always wanted to be a singer/songwriter kind of guy like a James Taylor or Crosby, Stills and Nash type of thing; I went to a lot of coffee houses and used to watch all those guys, but I never had the nerve to get up and do it because singing seems so personal and intimate to me. It was too revealing.

I knew that I wanted to be a singer/songwriter when I was much younger and, um, I've been able to, you know, to realize that dream and I'm very pleased with that...I want to branch out. I want to write. I write poetry...Music is an extraordinary vehicle for expressing emotion-very powerful emotions.

You make that climb, take it step by step and hopefully the view is great. I try to be a friend for Miley. I know that's not everyone's parenting style. But I try to be a friend, a partner as a singer, actor, songwriter and let her be a teenage girl and do her thing.

I feel like fans who like old Southern rock and country, and more lyric-driven songs in general, have come to country radio. I think that's why you see country radio growing and albums selling: People are craving a little more of the singer-songwriter stuff going on in country.

I was more of a light opera singer, not really much of a lounge singer.

I don't feel like God called me to be a gospel singer. He didn't call me to be a Christian singer; he called me to be a country singer, and I just happen to be a Christian.

Nina Simone was a gifted and prolific singer, songwriter and pianist who became a powerful presence in the civil rights movement and paid a professional price for it. Behind the scenes, she struggled in a fractious, sometimes violent relationship with her husband and manager and with mental health issues that strained other relationships, including with her only daughter.

For me, the singer is actually the most important element. When I work with someone, it all comes down to whether I like the singer or not.

I used to want to be a backup singer. Not a lead singer, because I really can't sing.

One of my favorite artists is Tom Waits, whom most people think of as a wonderful singer-songwriter and a great poet. I certainly think of him that way, but I also know him as a terrific actor. You know, that persona that he puts on when he's doing his music comes from being an actor, figuring out a persona.

I think being a singer-songwriter... your job is to tell a story that other people can't really tell themselves. And I really hope that people kinda go: "This happened once and I kind of like this song because I relate to it..." So if at least one of my songs over this tour's that song, then that's really cool.

Artie is a singer, and I'm a writer and player and a singer. We didn't work together on a creative level and prepare the songs. I did that.

I was in Ann Arbor, and I was told that this singer-songwriter guy wanted to meet me. It was Kurt Cobain. Nirvana had just made 'Bleach.' Kurt interviewed me on a college radio station. It was very strange. He was a fan of mine, and he gave me his album.

And that's the kind of thing people think, you know, that if you sign up to be a singer-songwriter you know how to deal with people setting up hate websites, or people being obsessed with you and crying when you touch them, but you don't, and you just have to deal with.

I'm not a folk or jazz singer, more a hard-edged pop singer - with some rock, and song hooks.

Audrey Auld is a great singer songwriter. She holds a unique place in contemporary Americana/Roots music. I believe that this uniqueness is largely due to the fact that she is Australian. This affords her a totally different attitude as an artist than traditional American contributors to this genre. Audrey is one of the most honest original artists I know.

I'm saying that she (Whitney Houston) looks great for a singer... the way Courtney Love is a singer.