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Song Quotes

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Song Quotes

“Along with a lot of other things, becoming a Bob Dylan fan made me a writer. I was never interested in figuring out what the songs meant. I was interested in figuring out my response to them, and other people's responses. I wanted to get closer to the music than I could by listening to it - I wanted to get inside of it, behind it, and writing about it through it, inside of it, behind it, was my way of doing that.”

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Book:Bob Dylan: Writings 1968-2010
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“What always attracted me to [Bob] Dylan, and what has sustained me as a Dylan listener, or has always continued to surprise me, is his voice, the way he sings, the way he wraps his voice around certain words, the way he backs off from melodic moments, the way he moves forward to grab something in a song that, were anybody else performing it, they would have no idea it was even there.”

WayIdeasMomentsMovingCertainSongVoiceSurpriseMoving ForwardNo IdeaPerformingBobListenersDylanWrapsSurprise Me
Author:Greil Marcus
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“I feel fortunate that I've had a lot of songs recorded by other people, because I take my songwriting very seriously. It's only those people that have followed me over the years and really know my work that know how serious I am about all of it - including the way I look. You can't take my high heels from me, you can't have my long fingernails, you can't take all this hair from me, because it's part of this thing that I've become. I wouldn't want to give any of it up. Do I have to be ugly to be a songwriter? This is the way I am, and it's what I choose to be.”

PeopleKnowsWayWantGivingFeelsYearsLooksLongSongMusicKnow HowSeriousHairLuckIncludingUglyFortunateSongwritingHeelsSongwritersHigh HeelsFingernails
Author:Dolly Parton
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“Marvin Gaye said there's a song inside of me and I can't get it out. And I know it's in there, and I can feel that it's in there, and I can't get it out. There's so much that I want to say, and I haven't been able to figure out how to say it in my art. I can only say it in ham-fisted, clumsy, nonpoetic ways, and I'm trying to figure out how to talk about life and talk about love and talk about pain and trials and tribulation in an artistic form.”

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Author:Will Smith
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“In Middle America men are awakening. Like awkward and untrained boys we begin to turn toward maturity and with our awakening we hunger for song. But in our towns and fields there are few memory haunted places. Here we stand in roaring city streets, on steaming coal heaps, in the shadow of factories from which come only the grinding roar of machines. We do not sing but mutter in the darkness. Our lips are cracked with dust and with the heat of furnaces. We but mutter and feel our way toward the promise of song.”

MenWayFeelsAmericaSongTurnsMemoriesCitiesBoysDarknessStreetsMiddleFieldsPromiseShadowMachinesTownsLipsHungerAwakeningDustMaturityHeatFactoriesAwkwardCoalCrackedRoaringFurnacesOur TownCity StreetsMiddle America
Author:Sherwood Anderson
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“Recognizing that the world is governed by a minority, the sexually active, and that they hold sway of a huge majority of the nonsexual, those people too young or too old or too poor or too homely or sick or crazy or powerless to be able to afford sexual partners (or the luxury of systematic, sustained and shared introspection, so sexual in its own way). All advertisements and films and songs are addressed to sexuals, to their rash whims and finicky tastes.”

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Author:Edmund White
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“It's not always easy for a father to understand the interests and ways of his son. It seems the songs of our children may be in keys we've never tried. The melody of each generation emerges from all that's gone before. Each one of us contributes in some unique way to the composition of life.”

WayMayChildrenSeemsSongFatherEasyInterestGoneGenerationsSonKeysUniqueOur ChildrenMelodyComposition
Book:Wisdom from the World According to Mister Rogers: Important Things to Remember
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“Music exists when rhythmic, melodic or harmonic order is deliberately created, and consciously listened to, and it is only language-using, self-conscious creatures ... who are capable of organizing sounds in this way, either when uttering them or when perceiving them. We can hear music in the song of the nightingale, but it is music that no nightingale has heard.”

WaySelfSongOrderLanguageSoundMusicHeardCreaturesCapableConsciousSelf ConsciousNightingales
Book:Understanding Music: Philosophy and Interpretation
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“My voice in combination with the harp - which, by the way, I use because I've played it my entire life, not to make some statement about the harp - somehow has ... coloured people's interpretations of the music and projected an idea of childlike or fairytale quality or innocence. Which sometimes prevents people from listening to the songs the way I would like them to be listened to.”

PeopleWayIdeasSometimesUseSongVoiceQualityListeningStatementsInnocenceCombinationInterpretationFairytaleChildlikeHarps
Author:Joanna Newsom
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“If you and I shall, like the believing shepherds, watch and long for His appearing, one day we, too, shall hear a music grander and sweeter even than the song of angels, when the great Composer shall transpose all the strains of earth from the minor into the major, when the wail of nature shall give way to the glad harmony of the everlasting jubilee.”

IfsWayGivingBelieveLongEarthSongWatchesOne DayMajorsAngelHarmonyGladComposerMinorsStrainEverlastingAppearingShepherdsJubilee
Author:Abbott Eliot Kittredge
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“If family and society tell you its unfeminine, not really womanly, to be aggressive, to speak up, to have strong opinions, to take up space, then women won't trust their own voice, because to be heard and to be influential, you've got to have a way to sing out with passion and love and self-trust - to sing out your song for everyone to hear.”

IfsWaySelfSongPassionSpeakStrongWomenVoiceSpaceOpinionHeardAnd LoveAggressiveInfluentialSelf TrustLove And PassionWomanlyStrong Opinions
Author:Elizabeth Lesser
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“I am truly amazed that after all this time, religious groups still need to attack entertainment and use these tragedies as a pitiful excuse for their own self-serving publicity. In response to their protests, I will provide a show where I balance my songs with a wholesome Bible reading. This way, fans will not only hear my so-called, violent point of view, but we can also examine the virtues of wonderful 'Christian' stories of disease, murder, adultery, suicide and child sacrifice. Now that seems like 'entertainment' to me.”

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Author:Marilyn Manson
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“As the Christian's sorrows multiply, his patience grows, until, with sweet, unruffled quiet, he can confront the ills of life, and, though inwardly wincing, can calmly pursue his way to the restful grave, while his old, harsh voice is softly cadenced into sweetest melody, like the faint notes of an angel's whispered song. As patience deepens, charity and sympathy increase.”

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Author:George Horace Lorimer
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“One song isn't going to ever change things, but I suppose it's the accumulation of music generally [that is]. If you can imagine a world that has no music in it, it would be a very different world, so music does change the world by virtue of all the music in it. Cumulative music of every kind, from banging a drum to playing a flute or recording symphonies, or singing 'War, what is it good for?' All those things change the whole way we live.”

IfsWorldWayKindDoeDifferentWarWholeWould BeSongVirtueImagineSingingChanging The WorldThings ChangeSymphonyAccumulationDifferent WorldsBangingFlutesCumulative
Author:Mick Jagger
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“Although music appeals simply to the emotions, and represents no definite images in itself, we are justified in using any language which may serve to convey to others our musical expressions. Words will often pave the way for the more subtle operations of music, and unlock the treasures which sound alone can rifle, and hence the eternal popularity of song.”

WayMaySongLanguageSoundEmotionExpressionEternalMusicalTreasureAppealsOperationsSubtlePopularityDefiniteJustifiedRiflesMusical Expression
Book:Music and morals
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“But there were years when, in search of what I thought was better, nobler things I denied these, my people, and my family. I forgot the songs they sung - and most of those songs are now dead; I erased their dialect from my tongue; I was ashamed of them and their ways of life. But now - yes, I love them; they are a part of my blood; they, with all their virtues and their faults, played a great part in forming my way of looking at life.”

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Author:Agnes Smedley
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“The pleasant converse of the fireside, the simple songs of home, the words of encouragement as I bend over my school-tasks, the kiss as I lie down to rest, the patient bearing with the freaks of my restless nature, the gentle counsels mingled with reproofs and approvals, the sympathy that meets and assuages every sorrow, and sweetens every little success--all these return to me amid the responsibilities which press upon me now, and I feel as if I had once lived in heaven, and, straying, had lost my way.”

IfsWayFeelsLittlesHomeSchoolLyingSongLostHeavenSimpleResponsibilityReturnSorrowKissingTasksEncouragementPressesPatientMy WayGentlePleasantFreakApprovalRestlessConversesWords Of EncouragementReproofReturn To Me
Author:J. G. Holland
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“There are many people writing songs. That is absolutely wonderful. Who knows, there may be some kid in diapers and he or she might succeed in capturing in a few dozen words what great writers have spent years trying to say. Just the right word in the right place with the right melody behind it and the right rhythm. It might get around the world inch by inch, and people realize that this world is in danger, that we're in danger. That's the way "This Land Is Your Land" got to be so well known.”

PeopleKnowsWorldWayWritingTryingYearsWellsMayMightKidsSongRealizingBehindsKnownWonderfulLandDangerThis WorldSucceedRhythmAround The WorldMelodyDozenInchesWell KnownRight PlaceWriting SongsGreat WritersRight WordsDiapers
Author:Pete Seeger
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