* some views expressed in these quotations not neccesarily endorsed by the author of this file.
* for entertainment only - history is not an exact science - dates and quotes not guaranteed for accuracy.
Janis [Joplin] was one of the few artists around who really knew how to handle an audience. The last thing she told me was that she didn't like the name "Janis" anymore. "I'm sick and tired of it" she said. "Call me Pearl."
Never stay up on the barren heights of cleverness, but come down into the green valleys of silliness.
I learned how to spell "respect" from Aretha Franklin and "encyclopedia" from Mickey Mouse.
People in England are so bloody nosey.
Hat's off, gentlemen--a genius!
Two kinds of dancer. Perfect steps. Perfect technique. Then there is music dancer. Not so perfect. Make mistakes. But music go right through body and onto audience.
This city [Los Angeles] so powerful that at a flip of a coin it can make me feel on top of the world, or like the most insecure, vulnerable person on the planet.
I have done an in-depth study of drug abuse and communist brainwashing techniques.
Xanadu -- It's not down on any map. True places never are.
The only time in history that any family has achieved No. 1 status with three successive generations. The Ozzie Nelson Orchestra went No. 1 in 1932 with "And Then Some," Rick in 1961 with "Poor Little Fool" and "Travelin' Man," and Matthew and Gunnar's 1990 "(I Can't Live Without Your) Love and Affection" which landed the Nelson Family in the Guinness Book Of World Records.
Does anybody really know what time it is? I don't. Does anybody really care? If so I can't imagine why about time. We've all got time enough to cry -- Oh no, no.
When one responsibly procures his families dinner by hand, each meal becomes a sacred rite, and the reality of life and death is undeniable. It is good, and so is the feast.
Too intense contemplation of his own genius had begun to undermine his health.
I was lucky enough to have it all those years; perhaps it'll never come back. Perhaps I don't have that creative spark anymore. Perhaps I'm not hungry enough. I could be bigger. I could be richer.
I think the best I'm hoping for is just a good song.
I've seen a lot of high-flying people hit the big time and then wonder why the fuck they don't feel special. Everybody's calling them special. That's one of the things that I think makes stars tend to take drugs and drink too much.
The curse to be misunderstood by our fellow-creatures falls on all who are in advance of their age.
Given the choice between accomplishing something and just lying around, I'd rather just lie around. No contest.
Well, I've wrestled with reality for 35 years, doctor; and I'm happy to state I finally won out over it.
You're only given a little spark of madness; you mustn't lose it.
How fucking stupid it all is. All that big hassle to make it, only to end up as performing fleas.
Benzodiazapene, Xanax & gin, somebody's feelin' no pain...
Sorry Rush, Newt and Jesse, but the artist as citizen is here to stay.
The most normal person I find in Hollywood is Madonna!
That thirst [for applause] if the last infirmity of noble minds, is also the first infirmity of weak ones.
Theater people are always pining and agonizing because they're afraid that they'll be forgotten. And in America they're quite right. They will be.
A work in progress quickly becomes feral. It reverts to a wild state overnight. It is barely domesticated, a mustang on which you one day fastened a halter, but which now you cannot catch. It is a lion you cage in your study. As the work grows, it gets harder to control; it is a lion growing in strength. You must visit it every day and reassert your mastery over it. If you skip a day, you are, quite rightly, afraid to open the door to its room.
Chops don't go away. It's just a matter of what you say with them that counts.
He that lives in hope danceth without musick.
Do not quench your inspiration and your imagination; do not become the slave of your model
You may give me the finest instrument in Europe but yet I should have no pleasure in playing on it to an ignorant, stubborn, or unsympathetic audience.
The enthusiastic applause of the public is naturally the aim of the musician: but true strength and reward he finds only in the applause of those who thoroughly understand, and feel with him.
Our wise and benevolent legislators have taken good care that an artist should ever remain the slave of miserable tradesmen.
Art is not hereditary; the laurels have to be won, and a thousand hands pluck at the wreath before it is firmly set on the artist's head.
Do you really imagine that an amateur can do, in the twinkling of an eye, what it has taken an artist days, months, nay, years, to accomplish?
A work of art that contains theories is like an object on which the price tag has been left.
I hate flowers. I paint them because they're cheaper than models and they don't move.