Quotes about singing

A collection of quotes on the topic of singing, song, likeness, doing.

Total 1466 quotes singing, filter:

„I would not let her work until she was eighteen, and believe me, since the time she was being strolled down the street in her stroller, people were saying, “Can I use her in my commercial? Can I put her in my movie?” “No!” But I did let her take any class that she wanted to take. Singing, acting, dancing…“

— Michelle Phillips Singer, actress 1944

On raising her daughter, Chynna Philips, The Huffington Post (August 25, 2016)

Dance, Time, People

„I want to keep working 24*7. When I am not singing, I go into deep introspection mode and start asking myself, why I am not getting much songs. I feel even working 24*7 every day is less for me.“

— Shreya Ghoshal Indian playback singer 1984

Talked about changes in career after marriage http://www.hindustantimes.com/bollywood/i-feel-restless-when-i-m-not-singing-want-to-work-24-7-shreya-ghoshal/story-hAKs3O9xVa8bQXvZvKpXIP.html

Feeling

„Big Brother isn’t watching. He’s singing and dancing. He’s pulling rabbits out of a hat. Big Brother’s busy holding your attention every moment you’re awake. He’s making sure you’re always distracted. He’s making sure you’re fully absorbed.“

— Chuck Palahniuk, book Lullaby

Source: Lullaby (2002), Chapter 3
Context: Old George Orwell got it backward. Big Brother isn't watching. He's singing and dancing. He's pulling rabbits out of a hat. Big Brother’s busy holding your attention every moment you're awake. He's making sure you're always distracted. He's making sure you're fully absorbed. He's making sure your imagination withers. Until it's as useful as your appendix. He's making sure your attention is always filled. And this being fed, it's worse than being watched. With the world always filling you, no one has to worry about what's in your mind. With everyone's imagination atrophied, no one will ever be a threat to the world.

Dance, Business

„When I sing, trouble can sit right on my shoulder and I don't even notice.“

— Sarah Vaughan American jazz singer 1924 - 1990

Interview, The New York Times, 1988

„Is your voice “silence”?
When you are not singing a song then I hear your song’s melody clearly!
Your voice is silence. Is your face “darkness”?
When I shut my eyes then I see your face clearly!
Your face is darkness.Is your shadow “light”?
Your shadow is cast on the dark window after the moon has gone down!
Your shadow is light.“

— Han Yong-un Korean writer 1879 - 1944

"Inverse Proportion", translated by Sammy Solberg

Silence, Light

„Then I would sing a little in the synagogue. See, if you're a singer, you love to turn your own ears on. You look for those rooms where the reverb is great. I remember the synagogue had a lot of wood and it was a great room. And it was a captive audience and you could sing these minor key songs and make them cry, and that was a thrill.“

— Art Garfunkel American singer, poet, and actor 1941

http://www.artgarfunkel.info/more.html

Cry, Love

„Birds sing after a storm; why shouldn't people feel as free to delight in whatever sunlight remains to them?“

— Rose Fitzgerald Kennedy American philanthropist and mother of John F. Kennedy 1890 - 1995

Bird, Feeling, People

„Michael Jackson, who can sing, and is a good lookin' guy - but ain't the most masculine fellow in the world.“

— Eddie Murphy American stand-up comedian, actor, and singer 1961

Eddie Murphy Delirious (1983)

Guy, World

„We all have our la-la-la song. The thing we do when the world isn't singing a nice tune to us. We sing our own nice tune to drown out ugly.“

— Rita Williams-Garcia, book One Crazy Summer

Source: One Crazy Summer

World

„Replying to Anatolii Kirillovich and Ilya Savelievich to their jokes about Aurica Rotaru during one of the rehearsals in Krasnodar [Russia] ('93):
- One more time, one can't here Aurica!
- Well, she is echoing in Moldavian…
- She is not echoing in Moldavian. I'll show you, khokhols!! Just sing, Aurica.
- Well, I am not singing in the beginning…“

— Sofia Rotaru Ukrainain soviet and Ukrainian musician, singer, songwriter, actress, author of Moldavian origin 1947

I'm telling you: sing.
Source: Sofia Rotaru's sister, also singer, back-stage vocal in 1993
Source: a Russian term used to describe a style of man's haircut that features a lock of hair sprouting from the top or the front of an otherwise closely shaven head. The word is also commonly used mostly by Russians as a derogatory name for Ukrainians, as it was a common haircut of Ukrainian Cossacks. [Sofia Rotaru is Ukrainian national, although of Moldavian origin considering herself also Russian]

Time

„Interview to the newspaper "Week" [Russian: "Неделя"/Nedelya], 1978:
-They say you started singing from the cradle?
-Couldn't do it in the cradle: the dummy was in the way.“

— Sofia Rotaru Ukrainain soviet and Ukrainian musician, singer, songwriter, actress, author of Moldavian origin 1947

Way

„Me still alone, me sip on the rum
Me wonder when the boat she come
To bring me love, oh sweet little thing
She rock 'n' roll, she dance and sing
She hold me tight, she touch me lips
Me eyes they close, me heart she flip
Havana moon, Havana moon“

— Chuck Berry American rock-and-roll musician 1926 - 2017

"Havana Moon" (1957)
Song lyrics

Dance, Heart, Love

„Yet came there never voice nor sign;
But through my being stole
Sense of a Universe divine,
And knowledge of a soul
Perfected in the joy of things,
The star, the flower, the bird that sings.“

— Francis William Bourdillon British poet 1852 - 1921

"The Chantry Of The Cherubim" in The Oxford Book of English Mystical Verse (1917) by D. H. S. Nicholson.
Context: p>I buoyed me on the wings of dream,
Above the world of sense;
I set my thought to sound the scheme,
And fathom the Immense;
I tuned my spirit as a lute
To catch wind-music wandering mute.Yet came there never voice nor sign;
But through my being stole
Sense of a Universe divine,
And knowledge of a soul
Perfected in the joy of things,
The star, the flower, the bird that sings.Nor I am more, nor less, than these;
All are one brotherhood;
I and all creatures, plants, and trees,
The living limbs of God;
And in an hour, as this, divine,
I feel the vast pulse throb in mine.</p

Perfection, Joy, Universe, Sense

„In my solitude I sing to myself a sweet lullaby, as sweet as my mother used to sing to me.“

— Albert Cohen Swiss writer 1895 - 1981

Le livre de ma mère [The Book of My Mother] (1954)

Solitude

„Valmiki went alone to the clear Ganga waterside and bathed. He washed away the anthill dust and peeled grey bark from a tree and made new fresh clothes. Then he sat back resting against a stone. He watched two small water birds in a tree nearby. The male bird was singing to his mate when before Valmiki’s eyes an arrow hit him, and the little bird fell from the limb. He thrashed on the ground an instant and then lay dead and blood drops strained his feathers.“

— Vālmīki, Ramayana

Source: Ramayana, p. 7.

Dead, Clothes, Water, Tree

„Hope is the thing with feathers
That perches in the soul
And sings the tune without the words
And never stops at all.“

— Emily Dickinson American poet 1830 - 1886

Hope, Inspirational, Soul, Hope

„When Life does not find a singer to sing her heart she produces a philosopher to speak her mind.“

— Khalil Gibran Lebanese artist, poet, and writer 1883 - 1931

Sand and Foam (1926)

Heart, Life

„What can I write about Vytautas Juozapaitis? Months ago, a singer with this same name gave one of the most Mozartean accounts of Don Giovanni I've ever experienced: a lean, yet warm sound, exciting and a little on the dangerous side - utterly (and wonderfully) self-absorbed. The man singing Giorgio Germont could not possibly have been this same artist. This was Verdi singing of the highest order - as if to the manor born. A molten, rich expressivity and attention to Verdian line that in its size, detail and musicality recalled the greats: Gorin, Merrill… you get the idea. The name may not trip off American tongues with ease… yet, but in an era often thought bereft of Verdian voices Juozapaitis is the real deal. Every moment of his Germont was filled passion and, like all of the cast members, every word of the Italian was naturally produced and understandable. Mama mia this man's got it!“

— Vytautas Juozapaitis Lithuanian opera singer 1963

Paolo Padillo, "A Traviata of Note: Teatro Lirico d'Europa". Opera - L (March, 2004) http://listserv.cuny.edu/Scripts/wa.exe?A2=ind0403d&L=opera-l&F=&S=&P=15287

Passion, Nature, Understanding, Idea

„Mozart didn't need a scheme for his music. He played and sang with the heavenly lightness of a child.“

— Joseph Goebbels Nazi politician and Propaganda Minister 1897 - 1945

Mozart brauchte kein Programm für seine Musik. Er musizierte und sang mit der göttlichen Leichtigkeit eines Kindes.
Michael: a German fate in diary notes (1926)

Light, Music

„I feel how inside of me word follows word and thought follows thought, growing to the last act of creation. Holy hour of bringing forth, you are pain and pleasure, and a longing for form, image and essence. I am only the instrument that God uses to sing his song. I am only the vessel that nature smilingly fills with new wine.“

— Joseph Goebbels Nazi politician and Propaganda Minister 1897 - 1945

Ich fühle, wie in mir sich wachsend Wort an Wort, Gedanke an Gedanke reiht zum letzten Akt der Schöpfung. Heilige Stunde des Gebärens, Schmerz bist du und Lust und eine Sehnsucht nach Form, Gestalt und Wesen. Ich bin nur Instrument, darauf der alte Gott sein Lied singt. Ich bin nur harrendes Gefäß, in das Natur den neuen Wein mit Lächeln füllt.
Michael: a German fate in diary notes (1926)

Wine, Nature, Feeling, Pleasure