Jerry Leiber Quotes

My dad has a really great record collection that basically went up to the year I was born: 1984.

I started buying records in the '80s. I listened to everything new wave, disco, funk synth-pop, rock, but in my house we were listening to bossa nova, tango, and folk.

The first record I bought may have been Del Shannon's 'Runaway.'

Growing up my mother played Sarah Vaughan and Nat Cole in the house regularly.

I like to listen to classical music... I like mainline jazz.

My mother was really into big band. It was played in the house all the time.

My father's record collection was full of New Orleans music of all kinds. I used to listen to the radio in New York, and all there was on it at the time was Madonna and Michael Jackson, so it sort of passed me by.

My parents were music lovers and collectors. It was around.

I've always loved records, even when I was a kid, my parents would buy me records instead of a lot of the other toys kids got. That's what I wanted. I've been collecting records and DJing my whole life, and I thank my parents for that. They had a big record collection and really imparted the magic of it on me.

I'll do a cappella stuff, rock 'n' roll and swing stuff.

I started off playing the clarinet, after I was inspired by listening to my dad's Benny Goodman records.

Every single tune you know from the 1940s until the 1970s was written, arranged, and demoed in the Brill Building. OK, maybe not every song, but writers from Benny Goodman to Lieber & Stoller to Neil Diamond all kept offices there.

It's hard to say a favorite song of my father's. I listen to all his stuff - a lot of the old stuff before the '70s.

Benny Goodman was one of the big influences as a clarinet player. That's why I wanted the clarinet.

I don't really know any other musicians like me. I grew up backstage with my dad who played in a post-war dance band, so I always feel at home at a venue.

All of my style came from listening to records.

Swing is my favorite kind of music.

I always liked jazz. And my people liked the old blues, race records and the doo-wop and all that.

I remember the first vinyl I bought: 'Purple Rain,' my favorite Prince album, ever.

All the music that I play today, I actually heard either at home or in my neighborhood when I was growing up in the '40s and '50s.

My first record I ever got was 'Full Moon Fever.' My dad gave me a copy when I was maybe nine years old or something. And I listened to the heck out of that record. I loved that record.

I know it might be surprising to some, but anyone who knows me - especially those who shared a changing room with me in my playing days who first told me I could sing - will tell you what a big fan I am of big band music.

I started using vinyl because I stole all my parents' records when I was 10. I didn't think about sound quality then, but I always loved how they sounded.

My dad had these great Benny Goodman albums that I was obsessed with, and Louis Prima's another guy I loved, and Peter Niro the jazz pianist. I loved international music: Irish music, Mexican music. I love the different colours that they all have.

My father was a part of that generation, and my mother, too - the late-'30s, early-'40s big-band generation. Frank Sinatra, Art Blakey, Gene Krupa, Billie Holiday - all that stuff was in my background.