Alan Arkin Quotes

I had known that I'd wanted to be an actor from a very early age, but I had always known that I wanted to have a dual career. I wanted to be an actor, and I also at that time wanted to be a rock star.

I just want to be a guy with a guitar.

Very unique: I was a singer-songwriter-guitarist. Very unusual in the late Seventies to find a singer-songwriter, and on top of that, a guitarist.

I wanted to be Joni Mitchell.

I learned classical guitar as a kid at about 7 or 8 years old. When I was about 14, I started dabbling in songwriting. That's when I got into the folky singer-songwriter style.

Before I became an actress, I was a cellist. I've been playing since I was 14, was in a lot of bands, and acting was more of a hobby.

My father was an actor. Both of my older brothers are actors. My younger sister is an actress. For me, that's my job; that's my craft. But then all through school and through drama school, I was gigging and running nights and playing in bands, and I just didn't want to let that go.

When you're not successful as a musician, you are oftentimes unemployed.

I'm not Amy the star, I'm Amy the girl with the guitar.

I started my career in Dallas, yes. I was born and raised in Dallas. I started my career there when I was very young. My guitar was bigger than I was. That's how young I was.

I just want to play guitar and be in a band. Same as I always did.

I played guitar all my life, all the way through the Yardbirds, but I knew that for me this was going to be a guitar vehicle, because that's what I wanted it to be.

I am, by nature, a guitar player... I learned all of these other instruments around that, and around the theory that I built learning the guitar.

It was 1988, I believe, that I met Grit. We were both appearing in a Canadian Folk Festival and as we sat backstage he handed me his guitar. I played it, loved it, and then found out that he'd made it himself.

I’m a self-confessed raw country boy and guitar-playing fool.

I like to work. I mean, part of it for me is that I was a struggling actor, could barely pay my rent, until I was almost 40.

After I finished school, I headed for Los Angeles, thinking, 'Movies. Beaches.' But I wanted to do serious stage work, so I upped sticks and moved to New York to study. I did the usual day jobs to support myself - waiting on tables, washing dishes, parking cars, anything to pay the rent. I was a terrible waiter, by the way.

It's a great gig, really: getting on stage, playing the guitar, singing. For a living, it's super.

I ended up starting guitar because I didn't want to just be the lead singer.

I don't think I'd want to concentrate on just acting because I love music, and things are going really well, so I think I will always continue to make music.

I started out doing the acting, and there was always an interest in music, and then the music just took off.

I was definitely drawn to the mythology of one man, one voice, and one guitar.

It's funny, I guess when I was growing up, I didn't really think about being an instrumentalist, per se. I didn't think, well, I want to be a piano player, or, I want to be a guitar player, or even, I want to be a singer. I just wanted to be a musician.

After school, instead of going into the restaurant scene, I very consciously took my guitar around everywhere I could, to Irish pubs and restaurants, and I played four nights a week to make ends meet.

Without busking, there is no Fantastic Negrito.