Jazz Singers

"I sang it about soldiers, then, later, about gay men. It touches me deeply every time. I used to perform this song at Mr Henry’s and people would be totally silent. I knew it moved them."

"I didn’t try to be a soul singer, a jazz singer, a blues singer – no category…My music is my expression of what I feel and believe in a moment."

"…There's no secret, no shortcut. Once you accept that being a writer or a creator is just really hard and takes a lot of hours of slogging through crappy first drafts, you just keep producing, and then you turn around and it's done. That's the magic."

"I want to have a beneficial effect on your physiology, but it’s not my business what happens after that…It’s my gift to you."

"There’s two sides of the coin: One where people don't expect you to do anything and won't let you do anything because they think you don't know how, and then the other side is when you're fucking up but they won't tell you because you're a girl. Then you don’t learn."

"Alchemy and magic are about how mundane, benign, and abundant materials can have an effect that is greater than the sum of their parts. To me, creativity is alchemy."

"I grew up surrounded by all types of music...You have to remember, Panama is a port so I always had contact with all types of music—from the big bands of Count Basie to all the Cuban bands of people like Benny Moré."

"I like to think of it as like watching The Godfather...You might have seen it 1,000 times, but when it comes on it makes you stop. Each time you see it, you find something different. That’s what I want people to get from my music."

"There's a moment in everybody's life...where you have more past than future, and then you better start organizing your time. So I thought maybe this is the time to do this. I'm not keen on people following me and recording my life and asking personal questions and what-not, but I figured I had to do it."

"The bully got bullied...and that was happening in all levels of society: governments were treating people badly, authorities were not doing what they were supposed to do and people saw in that example, a way of getting even."

"You made me cry, when you said goodbye Ain't that a shame My tears fell like rain Ain't that a shame You're the one to blame"

"I found my thrill On Blueberry Hill On Blueberry Hill When I found you."

"They call, they call me the fat man 'Cause I weight two hundred pounds All the girls they love me 'Cause I know my way around."

"Blue Monday how I hate Blue Monday Got to work like a slave all day Here come Tuesday, oh hard Tuesday I'm so tired got no time to play"

"In the 8th Grade I found I had a voice for opera, so I followed that path a little, but my impulse has always been an actor, I have always liked cinema, and let's face it, opera singers are just bad actors! I didn't want to translate myself in that direction. My heroes were people like Spencer Tracy, Bogart, Robert Mitchum, Marvin, Richardson, Caine, all those sort."

"I'm not the kind of actor to worry. Certain actors can't translate to the big screen, so I'm glad I can do both. If 60% of an audience know your name, a lot more will know your face. I have a name which has a certain level of recognition now, which also means producers and directors know me, and are able to recognise the range of things that I can do."

"The left in Hollywood are quick to flaunt their political allegiances; this provides them the ability to both grow in number and maintain their level of influence. Meanwhile, the right in Hollywood, for the most part, hide in the shadows and cower. When they do make their views known, conservatives are minimized and their careers are attacked as irrelevant, or as “not A-list enough.”"

"When I was a boy, while watching the funeral procession of the Great Martin Luther King Jr. on NBC, I observed a rickety wooden cart being pulled by two mules and behind the cart, a sea of people. In the cart lay the body of MLK; at that moment, he represented the totality of the human struggle. I remember feeling then, while watching the procession on TV, that we, as a country, were either going to pull together or else come apart."

"We live in a world of disposable music; fast-food music without any content... Music is not fireworks, music is feeling. So let's try to change this and bring music back which is really what matters."

"To me, Sarah Vaughan is the height of artistic genius in twentieth-century culture."

"They always ask me the same questions. Where was I born? When did I start singing? Who have I worked with? I don't understand why they can't just talk to me without all that question bit."

"I dig Doris Day."

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

"I've always been a Democrat, it runs in my family."

"Judy Garland was the singer I most wanted to sound like then, not to copy, but to get some of her soul and purity. A wonderful young voice."

"My dream is to do whatever I want without any interference from the record company."

"There are notes between notes, you know."

"There's a category for me. I like to be referred to as a good singer of good songs in good taste."

"I want to be what he wants when he wants it, and whenever he needs it And when he's lonesome and feelin' love starved I'll be there to feed it I'm givin' him a little bit for each day He turns me right on when I hear him say(Hey baby let's get away, let's go somewhere far) (Baby can we?) Well I don't care."

"Step n' move your hips With a feelin' from side to side Sit yourself down in your car And take a ride.And while you're movin' Rock steady Rock steady baby. Let's call this song exactly what it is (What it is -what it is - what it is)"

"People walkin' around everyday, Playin' games and takin' scores. Tryin' to make other people lose their minds. Well be careful you don't lose yours.Oh think (think) Think about what you're tryin' to do to me. Woo-hoo think (think) Let your mind go let yourself be free.You need me (need me) And I need you (don't cha know) Without each other There ain't nothin' we two can do."

"You walked in on the sly Scopin' for love In the crowd, I caught your eye You can't hide your stuff.You came to catch You thought I'd be naive and tame You met your match I beat you at your own game."

"R-E-S-P-E-C-T Find out what it means to me R-E-S-P-E-C-T Take care … TCB Sock it to me, Sock it to me, Sock it to me."

"Speak your name And I'll feel a thrill. You said I do, And I said I will.I tell you that I'll stay true, And give you just a little time. Wait on me baby, I want you to be all mine. I just get so blue.Since you've been gone, baby (why'd you do it? why'd you have to do it?)"

"In order to become Aretha Franklin you really have to be able to assess an inheritance and find yourself able to use it."

"Hopefully, these characters bring us closer to a sense of self: honest and honored. Icons: Toussaint Louverture to José Martí to lesser known heroes, Atahualpa and Denmark Vesey. We lace our visions with Celia Cruz and Aretha Franklin."

"What made her talent so great was her capacity to live what she sang. Her music was deepened by her connection to the struggles and the triumphs of the African American experience growing up in her father’s church, the community of Detroit, and her awareness of the turmoil of the South. She had a lifelong, unwavering commitment to civil rights and was one of the strongest supporters of the movement. She was our sister and our friend. Whenever I would see her, from time to time, she would always inquire about the well-being of people she met and worked with during the sixties.When she sang, she embodied what we were fighting for, and her music strengthened us. It revived us. When we would be released from jail after a non-violent protest, we might go to a late night club and let the music of Aretha Franklin fill our hearts. She was like a muse whose songs whispered the strength to continue on. Her music gave us a greater sense of determination to never give up or give in, and to keep the faith. She was a wonderful, talented human being. We mourn for Aretha Franklin. We have lost the Queen of Soul."

"Don’t count, feel! The only count I know, is Count Basie!"

"I’ve noticed, the wealthy part of my audience is unable to take in classical Romance for more than 40 minutes, one hour for them is maximum. The Art is to be apportioned for them in small doses. Like vitamins which are good for you in tiny portions but could be poisonous when taken in a bulk. Intelligentsia is prepared for such vitamins, while nouve riches are not. They have to begin with homeopathic doses."

"In the yearly days those nouvo riches were too busy. As they finally got their moneys grabbed, they started to look round and discovered emptiness, vacuum inside... It so happened that the whole new generation grew up with this feeling of emptiness. When, say, falling in love, such a person simply doesn’t know - how to experience an emotion. And then this question of Life’s reason arises. People don’t think about it until one day something happens. Then all of a sudden they find that their life is not particularly interesting. First they get bored, then get frightened. Because its frightening for one, after having got everything - houses, cars, stocks and funds, - to discover they haven’t a ground to stand on."

"It is absurd to say that we Africans were not in Africa when white people first came. And secondly, The conqueror writes history. They came, they conquered and they wrote. Now, you don't expect people who came to invade us to write the truth about us. They will always write negative things about us. And they have to do that because they have to justify their invasions in all the countries."

"We don't write our history. It has always been handed down to us orally by our elders."

"The white man, where ever he is, whether he is in the majority or the minority, he rules. It just proves to everyone that we have to keep fighting."

"I didn’t have much, but I was always happy to share what I did have. It seemed like every African that came to New York City would show up at my apartment door at dinnertime, and I couldn’t turn them away. I wasn’t much older than any of them, but they started calling me ‘Mama Africa’ and the name stuck."

"It's because they want to sound like Americans. I'd like to see them develop our music and sing it their way, but they think sounding American is going to take them higher, but it is not. They have beautiful voices, but they want to sound like Whitney Houston. You can't beat people like that at their own game. And they can't beat me at mine, either!"

"Girls are the future mothers of the , it is important we focus on their wellbeing."

"[W]hen the President's visitors came to Guinea, we were all called on to go and entertain them. I've never seen a country that did what Sékou Touré did for artists. Even in South Africa today we are not nurtured like that."

"[Belafonte] was a good teacher and looked after me. He said, 'You have such great talent, you must try not to be a tornado - be like a submarine. It was good advice when I found myself speaking at the UN Committee Against Apartheid and then the UN General Assembly."

"It was not a ban from the government. It was a cancellation by people who felt I should not be with Stokely because he was a rebel to them. I didn't care about that. He was somebody I loved, who loved me, and it was my life."

"Her voice and her battles influenced the process of liberation and democratic rebirth in South Africa."