Irvin Mayfield Quotes

Music and dance is part of everything in New Orleans. So I grew up appreciating it all.

The music is just so rich and part of the culture there. I suddenly felt like I needed to go on this mission to make sure we save New Orleans because - not that I can save anything - but it's so much part of what this country is, this whole mix of people coming together and doing this thing.

There are only two things: love, all sorts of love, with pretty girls, and the music of New Orleans or Duke Ellington. Everything else ought to go, because everything else is ugly.

I'm slowly feeling more Chinese and feel I should be more proud of being Chinese and appreciate where I've come from.

New Orleans, more than many places I know, actually tangibly lives its culture. It's not just a residual of life; it's a part of life. Music is at every major milestone of our life: birth, marriage, death. It's our culture.

You have to open your mind. I like the ability to express myself in a deep way. It's the closest music to our humanity - it's like a folk music that rises up out of a culture.

Music, art, theater. I'm just a big fan of beauty.

If New Orleans is allowed to die, a crucial part of the world's music heritage will disappear.

There's so much music going on in New Orleans.

Find a beautiful piece of art. If you fall in love with Van Gogh or Matisse or John Oliver Killens, or if you fall love with the music of Coltrane, the music of Aretha Franklin, or the music of Chopin - find some beautiful art and admire it, and realize that that was created by human beings just like you, no more human, no less.

I have always been part of a family with a great appreciation for the arts.

Even within K-pop, there should be more representation. It's not just groups, and it's not just incredibly produced, highly choreographed pieces. There are vocalists, there's R&B, there's hip-hop, there are other types of people and voices. There's space for all of that to be shared and to be appreciated.

I think that our work and our music stands on its own without this knowledge about our identity around it. But I also think that we very consciously decided not to hold back that part of ourselves, but to be very vocal about who we are, kind of what experiences we've had in life, and how we identify.

There's such a wealth of great music, clothes or whatever. There is so much great stuff out there, that why would you not still be interested if you've grown up in that kind of culture?

We try to use the talents we do have to express our deep feelings, to show our appreciation of all the contributions that came before us, and to add something to that flow. That's what's driven me.

I think we should appreciate ethnicity and diversity, and appreciate the uniqueness of all people, but I don't think we should be ethnocentric. These things are not ultimate.

If I had my life to live over again, I would have made a rule to read some poetry and listen to some music at least once every week.

The affairs of music ought, somehow, to terminate in the love of the beautiful.

Making dances is an act of progress; it is an act of growth, an act of music, an act of teaching, an act of celebration, an act of joy.

One of the things I'm going to say out there is how grateful I am - and how grateful the world is - for the tremendous gift of the black people, of jazz.

I grew up in a very culturally diverse area of America and I am very proud to come from there.

I've been told that nobody sings the word 'hunger' like I do.

... We have quite a large area, and that makes it more fun for us - certainly more satisfying, because it doesn't restrict us to one particular idea or one particular style. The result, I think, is pretty interesting ... we don't expect to make a fortune at it or ever be popular or famous or worshipped or hit The Ed Sullivan Show or the circuses or the big top. As long as we can play, we'll play, regardless of what it's for, who it's for or anything. It's fun for us - that's the important thing.

Sometimes I wonder about the people who can do very reflective work about their own ethnic group or their own families, or comedies that take place in the life that they've grown up in. That's a very special fortitude. Other brains have a curiosity for what they don't know - the life they're not leading.

Who is my role model and how long can I keep this going? I just move around and do different things and come back to music, try making films and come back to music, write children's books and come back to music.