Fred Astaire Quotes

We can use techniques in modifying things, in controlling things, but the first impulse has to be something that you simply cannot make just out of technique, or else it becomes perfectly evident that it is nothing but technique that you're exercising.

You can’t learn your craft by copying me or anyone else. I hope what I do can do is in some way inspire others but I would be appalled if I thought my work was being studied as ‘the right way to do the job’. My way is just one of an infinite number of ways to do the job.

When the artist is alive in any person, whatever his kind of work may be, he becomes an inventive, searching, daring, self-expressing creature.

Great writers create; writers of smaller gifts copy

When you're an artist, all you're trying to do is self-express.

I don't want ever to be guilty of what my critics claim: doing formula without original elements.

Those who do not want to imitate anything, produce nothing.

I'm into emulation, not imitation.

I always knew that I wanted to be creative, that I wanted to create something.

If you're not observing the world around you, in some sense you're not really an artist because then that means you're just replicating other people's stuff, or, I don't even know what you're doing.

I believe in creative work.

Your creativity before it gets formed into words and songs is the actual substance. No one else can see it, right? Unless you give it the shape of a song or a painting or whatever.

If I have a talent, it lies in the creative process.

You borrow from the greats, and you make your own path without losing the core of who you are.

I've worked with people who wanted to be creative every day: it was like a goal to arrive with something very special. Sometimes it's just disturbing, because special is good when it's needed. But when it's not needed, it's confusing, and you go away from the authenticity by a strong desire to be unique and singular.

I say to my pupils, 'You can pitch me any thing you've got, but tell me why you're the only person who can write it in the world. Keep digging.'

You can't ever create defensively. You just have to create the next thing that really speaks to you.

The key to artistry is being able to say stuff the way other people can't.

I've always been creating, no one had to teach me how to create, I always made things.

As an artist, I try not to sound the same as others. Or even as myself.

We're all inspired by what has come before us, but hope to use the inspiration to create our own. That's the artist's journey. It's a pretty amazing path.

I hope that the things that I sing about will be an inspiration for people to be original.

I think being an artist is having the courage to be original. Many great artists, including Picasso, have all been influenced by the great master paintings... And then finally, they leap, they take off... they become themselves. Then it looks like they just came out of nowhere. Just like 'Pow!'

To live is to express, and to express you have to create. Creation is never merely repetition. To live is to express oneself freely in creation.

An artist must be very careful not to look for models. As soon as one artist takes another as model, he is lost. There is no other point of departure than reality.