Buffy Sainte-Marie Quotes

I don't ever try to anticipate my audience. I just write the songs I want to write, and hope people like 'em.

Songs don't just suddenly arrive like a taxi you have to work on them and you have to put a lot of time and energy and self discipline into creating that kind of thing.

If you wanna write a song, ask a guitar

I don't think people care about the mechanics of songwriting.

No matter how many people try, no matter how many fancy songwriters in Los Angeles try to break it down to a formula... to an extent, there isn't a science to writing great songs, I suppose.

All you gotta do is think of the song in your head. And it doesn't matter whether you can play it or not, you can get somebody to play it. With songs I've written, there's a song called "The Statue", which I can't play. There are songs that I've written that I've actually just hummed on - there's a song on one of the albums they have there on the Internet called "My Love Was True" and it's almost operatic. I can't play it. But I can sing it.

I feel happy about the songs I've written. I'm a great lover of the craft of songwriting, and I sure admire it in other people when I see it - past and present. I feel comfortable with what I have accomplished. I feel happy to be able to work in that environment, and that I have a lot of songs left to be written, somewhere.

The craft, the writing of a song, is about creating a story, a life story, a world within three minutes, but that's the frame, if you like, the picture frame. That fascinates me.

I kind of like polishing the songs that I'm working on. I'm really working hard on some specific songs.

Composing music is hard work.

I usually have an idea of how I want a song to sound, but I don't always know how to get there.

I'm a songwriter who's put my childhood memories and teenage angst into songs.

The most miraculous process is watching a song go from a tiny idea in the middle of the night to something that 55,000 people are singing back to you.

I don't really love to perform in music. Some people like it more, but it's not my thing so much, but just the writing, when you get the lyric, and the lyric just goes just the right way, or you find the right bridge that takes you to the solo, and those moments are tremendous, and it's difficult to portray.

I'd love to write a song that someone else sings that can actually sing really well.

I honestly just hope to continue creating music that people can relate to and connect with in a personal way.

I get so excited when a song I wrote that's very personal to me goes No. 1 and I look down and see people singing the words back to me.

The melody will tell me what the song should be about, the tone of the song. That's when the intellect comes in. Because I have a list of possible titles and concepts, and I expand on that.

I'm always thinking about songs and how I can sing a song that would resonate with my voice, my persona. I want it to be a pleasant experience that's not just about hearing my voice. I remember some singers whose voices were so pretty, it didn't matter what they sang - you loved it.

It's not hard to create a song, but to write a song that's really going affect somebody? That takes a hell of a lot of time.

When I write the music for any of my songs, I write as a composer-lyricist in my head.

I had a really pleasant time composing music for 'Raaga.'

Songwriting is a burst of inspiration and then a long bit of work and a tremendous bit of desperation.

After writing quite a few songs now, I have not a method but a way of being patient with a couple of verses or a certain set of chords. I can match them up quicker now than I used to. The one thing you do improve is songwriting.

There was a recording studio in my school, and I knew this kid who had a key, so I'd write lyrics in school while I was in class, and then, in a 10-minute break, I recorded the song 'Hurt' in one go at the school studio.