Aleksey Igudesman Quotes

Undeniably, I'm a country singer; I'm a country songwriter. But I feel like I make country music for people who like country music and for people who don't.

When I was younger, I used to do that a lot: I would hear a part of a song that would really relax me and then put it on repeat. That would send me to sleep. It was quite obvious classical music, people like Penguin Cafe Orchestra, Erik Satie, Claude Debussy, Maurice Ravel.

In Hamburg, there are three major orchestras, an opera house, and one of the great concert-hall acoustics in Europe at the Laeiszhalle, in a town a fifth the size of London. And that's not unusual. In Germany, there are dozens of towns with two or three orchestras. The connection with music goes very, very deep.

It'll help you be imaginative if you listen to classical music. It helps you understand dynamics and how important they are to create an environment.

Dance music is no longer a simple Donna Summer beat. It's become a whole language that I find fascinating and exciting. Eventually, it will lose the dance tag and join the fore of rock.

In the early eighties, there were a lot of artists involved with the music scene. All those young artists, before their careers took off, were into music. Robert Longo used to play some guitar. He had a band for a while. Basquiat had a band. I mean, people were always trying to mix music and art - in fact, I'm guilty of it myself.

And what classical music does best and must always do more, is to show this kind of transformation of moods, to show a very wide psychological voyage. And I think that's something that we as classical musicians have underestimated.

I find that classical music helps put me in a place that is very calming and allows me to express emotion through my body. I played clarinet as a child, so I guess I have a bit of a musical ear.

Guys like Otis Blackwell and Bobby Darin, and all the guys who were writing songs for Elvis at the time, just hanging around, writing songs, talking about music.

There's been a shift: Country music is popular music now. Every other genre wants to come over to our land.

I grew up with classical music when I was a ballet dancer. Now when I have to prepare an emotional scene, to cry or whatever, I listen to sonatas. Vivaldi and stuff. It's just beautiful to me.

Hip-hop educated me about other forms of music, because it sampled from all different styles.

Because in classical music cello is not regarded as a popular choice, it's always playing the long, boring notes.

I had a big background in listening to classical music and I started trying to compose, like I was playing the guitar but I heard an orchestra in my head.

I was able to turn to classical music many people, who saw my programs live and on YouTube, and this is one of the nicest achievements I can have.

I've worked with some great orchestras and amazing classical musicians, but I don't like the conceptualization of classical music as an elitist form of art.

I've never been one for doing remixes. Then I've gotta decide which version am I gonna be tonight: country Carrie or pop Carrie? I'd rather just make country music that anybody can get into no matter what they listen to.

I was born out of classical music.

The Beatles and Ray Charles were in the same charts together, and that was just called pop music - it wasn't called soul or rock. The best pop music just stands out as something that's just original, and I think it should all be called pop again.

I grew up listening to - it's kind of embarrassing - all classical music.

I used to like to set different film clips to classical music, not even my own songs, but make little movies.

I used to go to Bourbon Street when I was a kid and there would be club after club after club of people who were around when the music started. I mean these are legendary, maybe not so well known, but legendary musicians.

It's interesting about classical music that the more you hear something, the more you get to know a piece, the better and better it gets, period, which is just an interesting thing on it.

For us, it is all about breaking the boundaries between different genres of music and combining different styles of music and performing what we are passionate about. We are so lucky that we can experience both worlds: the more intimate classical world and the wild and crazy world of rock n' roll.

Popularity gets up people's noses. But I understand the importance and the function of popular music. There is an artistic purpose. Popular music helps people to develop a curiosity and leads them towards classical music.