I always felt like there was a certain standard of music that I had to do from the beginning, even when I didn’t have the recognition that I have now.

I just wanted to be a composer; I became an actor by default, really. I got a scholarship to a college of music and drama, hoping to take a scholarship in music. But I ended up as an acting student, so I’ve stuck with that for the last 50-odd years.

I believe growth should be constant, sustained and inclusive. It’s only meaningful if these three things are there. Otherwise they’re just economic figures.

An investment in knowledge pays the best interest.

There was my name up in lights. I said, ‚God, somebody’s made a mistake.‘ But there it was, in lights. And I sat there and said, ‚Remember, you’re not a star.‘ Yet there it was up in lights.

‚Two Voices,‘ from my album with Peter Schwalm, is an intact dream-poem. I awoke one night with an image of a piece of paper and all the words of the poem written on it, so I just blundered down to the kitchen table and ‚copied it out.‘

I have always enjoyed watching my songs make people cry.

A record deal doesn’t make you an artist; you make yourself an artist.

Everywhere I go, the kids call me ‚the book lady.‘ The older I get, the more appreciative I seem to be of the ‚book lady‘ title. It makes me feel more like a legitimate person, not just a singer or an entertainer. But it makes me feel like I’ve done something good with my life and with my success.

Without continual growth and progress, such words as improvement, achievement, and success have no meaning.

People and organizations don’t grow much without delegation and completed staff work because they are confined to the capacities of the boss and reflect both personal strengths and weaknesses.

We do not rejoice in victories. We rejoice when a new kind of cotton is grown and when strawberries bloom in Israel.

There are only two things. Truth and lies. Truth is indivisible, hence it cannot recognize itself; anyone who wants to recognize it has to be a lie.

You get to a point where it’s like you can’t really do anything right, and people will pick on you for whatever decisions you make, so I just try and take no notice and get on with my music.

The violets in the mountains have broken the rocks.

I taught myself to play the guitar by listening to Paul Simon records, working it out note by note. He is an incredibly intelligent musician. He’s not someone who has a natural outpouring of melody like McCartney or Dylan, who are just terribly prolific with musical ideas.

You go to a festival, you know you’re not going to play all new material at a festival. The audience is not there for that. I’ve made that mistake, but you find out pretty quickly.

I was a super once – an extra – in ‚Die Fledermaus,‘ and was seated within three feet of Placido Domingo. I had never heard a voice of that beauty so close up. It felt as if an electric shock were running through me.

There is no education like adversity.

My purpose is to make exciting music, and I feel like I’ll be doing that for the rest of my life, so there’s no pressure.

Childhood is the sleep of reason.

The superior man is distressed by the limitations of his ability; he is not distressed by the fact that men do not recognize the ability that he has.

I sure lost my musical direction in Hollywood. My songs were the same conveyer belt mass production, just like most of my movies were.

I don’t like headphones very much, and I rarely listen to music on headphones.

All experience is an arch, to build upon.

I love making music. That’s what I love to do. So I don’t feel like there’s any need to take a break unless I want to.

My business acumen is definitely growing.

My main focus is always to do well on the field for the Indian cricket team. When people say good things about me off the field, I am more than happy to accept them.

There’s poetry in being the band that can sell out Wembley but also makes a record in a garage. I don’t like doing what people expect me to do.

How to play music may be known. At the commencement of the piece, all the parts should sound together. As it proceeds, they should be in harmony while severally distinct and flowing without break, and thus on to the conclusion.

I say, ‚Yeah, Taylor Swift.‘ I think she is a smart, beautiful girl. I think she’s making all the right moves. She’s got a good head on her shoulders. She’s surrounded with wonderful people. Her songs are great. She keeps herself anchored. She knows who she is, and she’s living and standing by that.

I do value the respect I get from my contemporaries, but to have Oasis cover my song, to have Puff Daddy cover a song, to have Goldie come along to my gigs – that’s where my ego is at. To have my fellow musicians like what I do, that’s very cool.

Men do change, and change comes like a little wind that ruffles the curtains at dawn, and it comes like the stealthy perfume of wildflowers hidden in the grass.

Whatever I’m feeling, whatever I’m going through, whatever mood I’m in… If I’m feeling like dancing or clubbing, then it will be reflected in the music. If I’m feeling dark and vulnerable, then it will reflect in the music, too.

I don’t sing because I’m happy; I’m happy because I sing.

On Saturday afternoons when all the things are done in the house and there’s no real work to be done, I play Bach and Chopin and turn it up real loudly and get a good bottle of chardonnay and sit out on my deck and look out at the garden.

One cannot and must not try to erase the past merely because it does not fit the present.

I always say, you gotta play a dive bar like you play an arena, and you play an arena like you play a dive bar.

What a heavy burden is a name that has become too famous.

In Puerto Rico we dance to everything.

Once you’ve changed who you are or who you’ve portrayed in your music, the fans, they’ll catch it… Once I feel like the world knows me for anything else but my music, then I feel like I failed.

I don’t want to make niche-oriented music.

I collect records. And cats. I don’t have any cats right now. But if I’m taking a walk and I see a cat, I’m happy.

I rate Morrissey as one of the best lyricists in Britain. For me, he’s up there with Bryan Ferry.

Faith is not something to grasp, it is a state to grow into.

I do probably 60 concerts a year in the States. And I go out to clubs in the week. I’m doing new stuff all the time.

So there’s nothing more provocative than taking a genre that everybody who’s cool hates – and then making it cool.

When you revolutionize education, you’re taking the very mechanism of how people be smarter and do new things, and you’re priming the pump for so many incredible things.

Of course awards matter.

Nothing recedes like progress.

One of my most popular songs, ‚Satellites,‘ I paid $300 for that beat on SoundClick.

My dad had a church of 90 people when I was born. It was just, over the years it continued to grow.

I love being a part of the country-music community.

I think that the idea of having a different approach to every single one of my albums is so exciting to me. I never want to make the same record twice. Why do it? What’s the point?

U2 is sort of song writing by accident really. We don’t really know what we’re doing and when we do, it doesn’t seem to help.

I play the harmonica. The only way I can play is if I get my car going really fast, and stick it out the window.

Punk is musical freedom. It’s saying, doing and playing what you want. In Webster’s terms, ‚nirvana‘ means freedom from pain, suffering and the external world, and that’s pretty close to my definition of Punk Rock.

It was always a plan that we were going to have a retail side with what were doing musically, like an Apple store or Nike Town. I wanted something where you can come get everything – ‚Marathon‘ or ‚All Money‘ or ‚Crenshaw‘ – and make it like an experience. Especially with what Crenshaw and Slauson meant to my story.

I think that by staying true to myself and making music from my heart, the blessings come.

Success does not consist in never making mistakes but in never making the same one a second time.

I guess you could say I devoted myself so strongly to my music that for awhile I forgot about my family. But I only get one set of parents, and I think I forgot about that for a little while.