Yann Tiersen Quotes

Immediate, simultaneous connection between the audience and a performer is crucial to me. It's why I do what I do. Other things, like recording, are satisfying, but they're not the same. I love the connection I get with the audience when I'm sitting behind that piano.

With Dream Theater live, I may have been a bit of a focal point because I absolutely live for the energy on stage, and having interaction with the audience is absolutely crucial to me - regardless of how some others have described it!

The energy that comes when you compel people to dance stays with you your whole career - whether you are playing to 100,000 people at Glastonbury or 1,000 kids in a club.

I just feed off the energy of the audience.

I love the intimacy of venues like the House of Blues. When everyone is packed in and so close to you, it makes you play differently. It's so much more fun to play because there's so much more high energy in a place like that.

When playing any song in front of an audience, you're watching them experience it, and it changes. In a lot of ways, it's almost like the music is just the background buzz to what's happening between you and the audience in the room.

I still get thrilled by the energy that is a live performance, the fear and the panic and the electricity that happens on the night. I think jolting myself every once in a while with that fear is a good thing for me.

When you're onstage, you're acutely aware of the reaction of a particular group of people, because it's like a wave.

It was really strange for me when I started to play concerts in America where the audiences were all sitting down.

I love playing live, I don't like studios all that much. I need the reaction of the audience.

I feed off the audience a lot, their energy.

Performing in front of an audience gives you an extra ten per cent energy and the chance to react to the instant feedback.

There's nothing like performing in front of a live crowd and just having people literally react to whatever it is you do, and there's nothing better than when you get that connection with the audience.

I'm always making micro-adjustments onstage, listening to the audience, and what a crowd is like can be infectious.

It's hard not to be affected by the live audience.

Musicians are there in front of you, and the spectators sense their tension, which is not the case when you're listening to a record. Your attention is more relaxed. The emotional aspect is more important in live music.

I take a lot of pride in my live show and put more energy there than I do in the studio.

When you get onstage, you can see everyone in the audience's face, down to the detail. You can see who may or may not be yawning.

One of the main reasons for wanting to perform live again was to have contact with that audience.

I know two kinds of audiences only - one coughing, and one not coughing.

I can tell how I'm doing, and I can tell if the crowd is particularly dead.

Playing live is such a total visceral experience, and really, as a musician, you're trained from the beginning to be a live performer.

When I play live, I feel how the audience is going and follow and lead at the same time.

There's nothing like walking out and watching the people get turned on. Nothing in the world could replace it.

On stage, we just want to generate hysteria. We don't care about looking cool or posing.