I really appreciate the moments that I was able to win rap album of the year or whatever.

Let not a libation of tears be the only offering at the shrine of Jesus; let us also rejoice with joy unspeakable. If we have need to lament our sin, how much more to rejoice at our pardon!

To the audience, it’s like I’m changing the subject every five seconds, but to me, my show’s almost like a 90-minute song that I know exactly. I wrote every note, and I know exactly where everything is.

The aim of life is appreciation; there is no sense in not appreciating things; and there is no sense in having more of them if you have less appreciation of them.

It is foolish and wrong to mourn the men who died. Rather we should thank God that such men lived.

The basis of our partnership strategy and our partnership approach: We build the social technology. They provide the music.

The opera is to music what a bawdy house is to a cathedral.

‚Evil men have no songs.‘ How is it that the Russians have songs?

Never take anything for granted.

Believe it or not, I was just given an honorary doctorate degree from the University of Tennessee.

If it wasn’t for baseball, I’d be in either the penitentiary or the cemetery.

My only scheme was to be a rapper.

When you are aspiring to the highest place, it is honorable to reach the second or even the third rank.

Five or six songs leaked from the original version of ‚Encore.‘ So I had to go in and make new songs to replace them.

In Puerto Rico we dance to everything.

I’m just glad I play for Coach Belichick.

I just wanted to be a songwriter. I did really not like the sound of my own voice.

My whole life, I’ve sung and listened to music, and since the beginning, I’ve had iTunes and used Apple Music for streaming.

Taylor Swift’s audience can listen to me, but so can the street kids. I want to touch it all.

Music is like film to me.

The thermometer of success is merely the jealousy of the malcontents.

It’s terrifying to play your favorite band’s song in front of your favorite band.

I’m not suggesting people abandon musical instruments and start playing their cars and apartments, but I do think the reign of music as a commodity made only by professionals might be winding down.

I was part of Jazzercise class. It was an aerobics routine accompanied by loud music, sounding quite awful to me. Jazzercise was popular in the ’80s and ’90s.

I pay a lot of tax, and I feel, one of the reasons I stay and pay why I’m not based in Monaco… I think my country helped me.

I’ve been very fortunate.

What one has to do usually can be done.

I listen to music that is of our time and I just get angry.

Music is not math. It’s science. You keep mixing the stuff up until it blows up on you, or it becomes this incredible potion.

You have to be a bastard to make it, and that’s a fact. And the Beatles are the biggest bastards on earth.

Excellence is a continuous process and not an accident.

I didn’t have nothin‘ going for me… school, home… until I found something I loved, which was music, and that changed everything.

You can’t have everything. Where would you put it?

My music fights against the system that teaches to live and die.

I know that when I pray, something wonderful happens. Not just to the person or persons for whom I’m praying, but also something wonderful happens to me. I’m grateful that I’m heard.

We are going to transform Britain’s rail system from the worst in the world to the best. If you can do a few things like that, when the body gives out, you can say you’ve lived a good life.

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 used to – my earliest memory of waking up with a melody in my head was, you know, 8, 9, 10. I’ve always heard kind of melodies in my head.

I’ve never thought about songwriting as a weapon. I’ve only thought about it as a way to help me get through love and loss and sadness and loneliness and growing up.

Speech is an arrangement of notes that will never be played again.

At the end of the day, who I really and truly am is a little girl who loved to play the piano.

Never interrupt someone doing what you said couldn’t be done.

Pretension is a poor joke that you play on yourself. Snap out of it. Recognise your strengths, work on your weaknesses. Real achievement is liking what you see in the mirror every morning.

You don’t choose your family. They are God’s gift to you, as you are to them.

Applause is a receipt, not a bill.

For some reason, I’m really comfortable talking about my personal life in songs.

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

NASA has been one of the most successful public investments in motivating students to do well and achieve all they can achieve. It’s sad that we are turning the programme in a direction where it will reduce the amount of motivation and stimulation it provides to young people.

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

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

I used to sing songs and write with my uncle, Bill Owens.

I have written a book. This will come as quite a shock to some. They didn’t think I could read, much less write.

The age of a woman doesn’t mean a thing. The best tunes are played on the oldest fiddles.

Think of yourself as on the threshold of unparalleled success. A whole, clear, glorious life lies before you. Achieve! Achieve!

All achievements, all earned riches, have their beginning in an idea.

The important achievement of Apollo was demonstrating that humanity is not forever chained to this planet and our visions go rather further than that and our opportunities are unlimited.

When I’m writing a record, I kind of don’t listen to much music. Just because I want to be inspired solely on the emotion; just based on how it feels.

I was always singing but didn’t plan on pursuing it seriously. When I got to New York City when I was 18, I started playing in clubs in Brooklyn – I have good friends and devoted fans on the underground scene, but we were playing for each other at that point – and that was it.

Working with our military community has been the biggest honor of my life.

The effect of music on fashion has been immense, especially hip-hop and urban music.

The secret of success in life is for a man to be ready for his opportunity when it comes.