Famous Quotes & Sayings

Steve Earle

I don't separate writing songs from poetry and short fiction. In the area where I work in my house, there's a word processor and a guitar.

Steve Earle

Greg Trooper writes great songs, including one of my very favorite songs in the world, Little Sister. On top of all that, there's his voice - an instrument I have coveted for 15 years.

Steve Earle

All we do as songwriters is rewrite the songs that have impressed us till we find our own voice. It's part of learning the craft.

Steve Earle

Back then, the business depended on bohemians. ... They needed Kristofferson and Roger Miller ..It was the tail end of something...the last Tin Pan Alley. ...and we were the night shift! They gave us keys, because they knew the best songs weren't written in daylight.... We got our keys taken away several times...me and Guy Clark.

Stephen Spender

I think continually of those who were truly great . Who, from the womb, remembered the soul 's history Through corridors of light where the hours are suns , Endless and singing. Whose lovely ambition Was that their lips, still touched with fire , Should tell of the spirit clothed from head to foot in song .

Stephen Sondheim

I like songs that are part of a dramatic texture, and therefore I like the scenes to be active. I wanna follow the story and that means you lean on the actors.

Stephen Sondheim

I don't write songs apart from theatrical pieces. I'm not interested in writing songs qua songs.

Stephen Sondheim

I get some flak for and some resistance from colleagues for because I'm interested in storytelling. I mean what I like about songwriting is songs used to tell a story.

Stephen Sondheim

A song is such a short form ... that 'the slightest flaw seems like a mountain.' And so every song needs to be revised 'til it's close to perfection... But achieving perfection takes a lot of energy.

Stephen Sondheim

On stage, generally speaking, the story is stopped or held back by songs, because that's the convention. Audiences enjoy the song and the singer, that's the point.

Stephen Sondheim

In the Rodgers and Hammerstein generation, popular hits came out of shows and movies.

Stephen Sondheim

So many good songs get written fast, because you know exactly what has to work.

Stephen Sondheim

I don't listen to recordings of my songs. I don't avoid it, I just don't go out of my way to do it.

Stephen Sondheim

If you're dealing with a musical in which you're trying to tell a story, it's got to sound like speech. At the same time it's got to be a song.

Stephen Sondheim

There's something inimical about the camera and song.

Stephen Sondheim

I didn't really want to write just lyrics, but I wanted to meet Leonard Bernstein. Music was always the first reason I was writing songs.

Stephen Sondheim

Hit songs did not come out of musicals. Pop-rock was creating the hits. There were very few songs that made the charts out of any Broadway musical.

Stephen Sondheim

Almost all the shows I've been connected with have been extremely well cast. They're playing the show, not just doing the songs.

Stephen Sondheim

A close-up on screen can say all a song can.

Stephen Sondheim

After the Rodgers and Hammerstein revolution, songs became part of the story, as opposed to just entertainments in between comedy scenes.

Stephen Foster

I sought to reform minstrelsy among refined people by making words suitable to their taste, instead of the trashy and really offensive words which belong to some songs of that order. ... Some of my songs should be performed in a pathetic, not a comic style.

Molly Tarlov

I love Miley Cyrus. "We Can't Stop" is my ringtone. It's, like, one of eight songs that I have on my phone. I listen to it on repeat. It helps you to do anything you need to do. I'm at the gym, "We Can't Stop" is great. I'm trying to fall asleep: "We Can't Stop."

Molly Ringwald

I can't' really sing a song unless I really connect with the lyrics.

Mohammed Reza Pahlavi

contrary to what many believed, my father was kind and tenderhearted, especially towards his family. His forbidding sternness seemed to melt into love, kindness, and easy familiarity when he was with us. Especially with me, his acknowledged successor to the throne, he would play lightheartedly. When we were alone together, he would sing me little songs; I don't remember his ever doing this in front of others, but when only the two of us were there, he would often sing to me.

Miranda Cosgrove

With the 'iCarly' soundtrack, I didn't get to write any of the songs. I just picked songs that meant a lot to me that I really liked.

Miranda Cosgrove

I write songs all the time in my room. I play them for my friends and family.

Paula Rego

I get inspiration from things that have nothing to do with painting: caricature, items from newspapers, sights in the street, proverbs, nursery-rhymes, children's games and songs, nightmares, desires, terrors. ... That question [why do you paint?] has been put to me before and my answer was, 'To give terror a face.' But it's more than that. I paint because I can't help it.

Peter Tork

Original Monkees' songs were produced very thinly, on purpose.

Peter Tosh

I don't have to say I'm going to make a song. A song is always there. I just have to open my mouth and a song comes out.

Peter Tosh

My songs is hard stuff which politicians don't want on them radio station because they still want people to live in ignorancy.

Peter King

If we have another 2,000 people killed, I want Nancy Pelosi and George Soros, John Conyers and Pat Leahy to go to the funeral and say, 'Your son was vaporized because we didn't want to dump some guy's head under water for 30 seconds.'

Peter Kreeft

Mary's light is like that of the moon, totally reflected from the sun, the Son of God.

Peter Fonda

Henry Fonda's son: That's how everybody identified me until Easy Rider came along. Good old Captain America.