Sometimes I think that there’s a fine line between impressionistic and messy.

Unless I am both capable of and willing to reopen the wound every time I write a song, if I choose to not look inside myself to write music, I’m really not worth being called an artist at all.

In business or in life, don’t follow the wagon tracks too closely.

The artist forges himself to the others, midway between the beauty he cannot do without and the community he cannot tear himself away from. That is why true artists scorn nothing: they are obliged to understand rather than to judge.

I guess I’m just inspired to tell stories.

The best interpreter of the law is custom.

When I have an idea, I turn down the flame, as if it were a little alcohol stove, as low as it will go. Then it explodes and that is my idea.

I’ve written some great things. That’s a gift, but there’s consequences. Yeah, you get this great work, but you suffer. You really, really suffer.

If art is to nourish the roots of our culture, society must set the artist free to follow his vision wherever it takes him.

It’s good to wander into the studio and walk out with something that’s better than you’d imagined it to be. If everything was as you imagined it to be, it just wouldn’t be as much fun.

I dream of painting and then I paint my dream.

At Microsoft there are lots of brilliant ideas but the image is that they all come from the top – I’m afraid that’s not quite right.

All of my music is honest.

Educationists should build the capacities of the spirit of inquiry, creativity, entrepreneurial and moral leadership among students and become their role model.

We all sort of do want incentives for creative people to still exist at a certain level. You know, maybe rock stars shouldn’t make as much; who knows? But you want as much creativity to take place in the future as took place in the past.

Genius, when young, is divine.

The aim of art is to represent not the outward appearance of things, but their inward significance.

Those who create are rare; those who cannot are numerous. Therefore, the latter are stronger.

It’s a representation of yourself, and you can express a lot of your creativity with what your wearing.

No art can be noble which is incapable of expressing thought, and no art is capable of expressing thought which does not change.

Find enough clever things to say, and you’re a Prime Minister; write them down and you’re a Shakespeare.

No person who is not a great sculptor or painter can be an architect. If he is not a sculptor or painter, he can only be a builder.

In the future, you won’t buy artists‘ works; you’ll buy software that makes original pieces of ‚their‘ works, or that recreates their way of looking at things. You could buy a Shostakovich box, or you could buy a Brahms box. You might want some Shostakovich slow-movement-like music to be generated. So then you use that box.

I don’t know that my schooling was conducive to wild ideas and creativity, but it gave me discipline, drive. They taught me how to think. I really know how to think.

History is a set of lies agreed upon.

I write songs that are like diary entries. I have to do it in order to feel sane.

It is after all the greatest art to limit and isolate oneself.

I do not think there is any thrill that can go through the human heart like that felt by the inventor as he sees some creation of the brain unfolding to success… such emotions make a man forget food, sleep, friends, love, everything.

Young people are fitter to invent than to judge; fitter for execution than for counsel; and more fit for new projects than for settled business.

People want to know why I do this, why I write such gross stuff. I like to tell them I have the heart of a small boy… and I keep it in a jar on my desk.

It’s insane that, since the Beatles and Dylan, it’s assumed that all musicians should do everything themselves. It’s that ridiculous, teenage idea that when Mick Jagger sings, he’s telling you something about his own life. It’s so arrogant to think that people would want to know about it anyway!

You have to be practical. So every time I say, if you want to write a novel you have to be practical, people get bored. They are disappointed. They are expecting a more dynamic, creative, artistic thing to say. What I want to say is: you have to be practical.

Every bad situation is a blues song waiting to happen.

People always say when they meet me that I’m not what they expect. I assume they think I’m this super dark and depressing guy, but I like to channel all of those emotions into my work.

The idea that you encourage companies to take their innovative thinkers and think about the most needy – even beyond the market opportunities – that’s something that appropriately ought to be done.

The society based on production is only productive, not creative.

Begin noticing and being careful about keeping your imagination free of thoughts that you do not wish to materialize. Instead, initiate a practice of filling your creative thoughts to overflow with ideas and wishes that you fully intend to manifest. Honor your imaginings regardless of others seeing them as crazy or impossible.

My mother was always fascinated with the fact that I could rhyme so much stuff.

Art is never finished, only abandoned.

Good thinkers always prime the pump of ideas. They always look for things to get the thinking process started, because what you put in always impacts what comes out.

When I started working on ambient music, my idea was to make music that was more like painting.

Science investigates; religion interprets. Science gives man knowledge which is power; religion gives man wisdom which is control.

I’m never gonna step away from stand-up. I can’t. That’s what got me where I am, and that’s also my muse. That’s how I stay level-headed. That’s what keeps me going.

Like music and art, love of nature is a common language that can transcend political or social boundaries.

There are few cases in which mere popularity should be considered a proper test of merit; but the case of song-writing is, I think, one of the few.

I worked with Congress on legislation, gave speeches to CEOs, military generals and Hollywood executives. But I also worked to ensure that my efforts would resonate with kids and families – and that meant doing things in a creative and unconventional way. So, yeah, I planted a garden and hula-hooped on the White House lawn with kids.

Poetry is the key to the hieroglyphics of nature.

You should treat a muse like a fairy.

Yes, there is a terrible moral in ‚Dorian Gray‘ – a moral which the prurient will not be able to find in it, but it will be revealed to all whose minds are healthy. Is this an artistic error? I fear it is. It is the only error in the book.

Imperfection is beauty, madness is genius and it’s better to be absolutely ridiculous than absolutely boring.

In art, the hand can never execute anything higher than the heart can imagine.

Everybody born comes from the Creator trailing wisps of glory. We come from the Creator with creativity. I think that each one of us is born with creativity.

The solar system can support a trillion humans. And then we’d have a thousand Mozarts and a thousand Einsteins.

A solution built by an artist serves the artist more than the solution the capitalist comes up with.

Art! Who comprehends her? With whom can one consult concerning this great goddess?

If you hear a voice within you say ‚you cannot paint,‘ then by all means paint, and that voice will be silenced.

I became interested in folk music because I had to make it somehow.

Getting a great idea with song writing is a lot like love. You don’t know why this one is different, but it is. You don’t know why this one is better, but it is. It sticks in your head, and you can’t stop thinking about it.

You can’t do it unless you can imagine it.

When I write, I write about my surroundings. Sometimes it’s light, and sometimes it gets very dark.

Don’t be a writer; it’s a terrible way to live your life. There’s nothing to be gained from it but poverty and obscurity and solitude. So if you have a taste for all those things, which means that you really are burning to do it, then go ahead and do it. But don’t expect anything from anybody.