I suspect music is auditory cheesecake, an exquisite confection crafted to tickle the sensitive spots of... our mental faculties.
The simplest beats, on what rock music or any music has been formed on, can be the toughest beats to execute and perform, because it's really easy to not respect a simple 4/4 beat, because people always want to play fast.
To me, music is not a stunt. Music is not a joke. I take every lick of music that I've ever played very serious.
I want to be the most melodic artist. 'His music ability, the way he write, his creativity is undeniable.' I want people to say that about me.
These days I can really get the strings to snap if I want.
Good music is good music, and everything else can go to hell.
A composer is a guy who goes around forcing his will on unsuspecting air molecules, often with the assistance of unsuspecting musicians.
The saxophone is an imperfect instrument, especially the tenor and soprano, as far as intonation goes. The challenge is to sing on an imperfect instrument that is outside of your body.
Through conducting, you express through your arms, through your face and even the body, what you want to tell, so the musicians of the orchestra understand.
It is easy to write unthinking music.
I think musicians naturally gravitate toward music that sounds real.
I don't have time to listen to anybody's music. I'm making it, you know.
I wanted to develop a guitar style where phrases and lines get there just in the nick of time, like with Curtis Mayfield and Steve Cropper. Subtleties mean so much, and there is a stunning beauty in them.
I really think there are two genres of music: good music and bad music. And I'm just trying to be on the side of making good music.
I'm a funny person, but I take my music seriously.
I don't want to be just that transgender performer or that transgender musical artist. I want to create songs and art and have those be judged on their merit alone.
It's been a thrilling journey - I have had to really learn that an orchestra is an entity - it's a creature. I have been calling it the dragon and the conductor is the dragon tamer. And you just have to... ride and don't let go and you will be fine.
That's what I wanted to do was play music.
I know what my taste is, and I do like my touch on the piano.
There are times, like with Dire Straits, where you can get as close as you can be to being good at your instrument and not cross over to that tasteless place.
Music is a language, you see, a universal language.
I always imagined that to bring an orchestra to play together is not enough for a conductor.
Singing into a microphone and learning to play an instrument - learning to do your craft - that's the most important thing! It's not about what goes on in a computer!
I want to speak in the tradition of rhythm and blues and soul music, but also push how it's dressed and how it's delivered to the audience. And hopefully that gets embraced by as many people as possible, but the goal isn't necessarily to speak to everyone. The goal is to get it out as exact as it is in my head.
I think that Bob Dylan knows this more than all of us: you don't write the songs anyhow. So if you're lucky, you can keep the vehicle healthy and responsive over the years. If you're lucky, your own intentions have very little to do with this.
