Joshua Bell Quotes

Pop is actually my least favorite kind of music, because it lacks real depth.

I don't like the word 'urban' because I think it's a bit of a generalisation and they use it to class music, but I don't think it's a word that necessarily classes music.

Blues and soul and jazz music has so much pain, so much beauty of raw emotion and passion.

I don't see how they can with most of my pieces, but I think it's unfortunate that they can through familiarity with flashy performances of a great deal of other music.

You can see it on the Internet: There's an argument going on continually about, 'What is folk music?' And I don't really want to get involved in that. It's an endless argument, a 'How many angels can dance on the head of a pin?' kind of argument.

I've always tried to stay clear of being labeled, putting a label on what type of music that I make.

So basically, I think music at its best can be everything. It can be totally stupid and very intellectual and emotional at the same time. I don't think all those things shut each other out.

Music is wonderful. Especially if there's some kind of content to it.

I tend to not want to put labels or categories on the music, only because people come with preconceived ideas about what they're going to hear, or won't come for this reason.

Music is split up now into little pockets.

But those musics do not address the larger kind of architecture in time that classical music does, whatever each one of us knows that classical music must mean.

A name doesn't make the music. It's just called that to differentiate it from other types of music.

I thought I knew a lot about music. Then you start digging and the deeper you go, the more there is.

When you're a little kid, you just like music that makes you happy and is fun. As you get older, you reach college or your 20s and you decide that music should be challenging and all art should be smart. So you start to think it makes you like high art more to put down things you consider low art. I don't even think things are low art.

You can never judge any music by their audience. That's the main reason people in England have a prejudice against someone like Skrillex. You judge people by their music. That's always been first and foremost.

The way popular music is categorized and formatted cuts down on everyone's options. And although people don't talk about it, there are a lot of issues of race determining musical categories of what's rock, R&B, or even folk. It ends up restricting creativity.

The problem we have is that, some people call it 'too rock' to play on a jazz station, and it's 'too jazz' to play on a rock station. So it's difficult. It's difficult to make it playing this kind of music.

If you ask me what genre 'Beyond' is, it's really difficult for me to answer.

I don't think a song should be put in a category.

What makes one type of music classical and one bluegrass and one folk - these things aren't what's important.

Music that is born complex is not inherently better or worse than music that is born simple.

People are always defining and re-defining music. My style of playing has been characterized as smooth jazz and acid jazz. I listen as I play; I'm not caught up in defining the type of music I play.

I have a very difficult time describing my music. Because I run into people in the hardware store and they go, 'Oh, you're a musician. So what kind of music do you play?' And I go, 'Uh, I've been doin' this for many years - I don't know what to call it.'

I cannot conceive of music that expresses absolutely nothing.

When you look back on music history, it falls into these neat periods, but of course, the period you yourself are living through seems totally scattered and chaotic.