Elliott Yamin Quotes

I used to play in bands and my dad, he's a big Beatles fan, so I grew up on a lot of Beatles and you kind of find your own way in music.

I have loved music so much from when I was little, and I don't know whether it was because I saw my dad doing it and then I got the idea; I don't know what came first... But I always had a hairbrush in the mirror singing. I was always with him backstage; I would go out and be pulled in for the last song.

The many sounds of Memphis shaped my early musical career and continue to be an inspiration to this day.

My voice is a combination of how I grew up and what I was listening to growing up. I like a lot of different kinds of music and am always being inspired in different ways by different artists for different reasons.

I didn't want to go out and change anything. I just wanted to make the music that was part of my background, which was rock and blues and hip-hop.

I always been writing songs since I was, like, six. I was listening to Dean Martin, Frank Sinatra, and Frankie Laine and people like that. I was just in the backyard writing songs.

When children start to speak they find their own voice by imitating the sounds around them. It would follow that bands do the same. Bands will find their own voice at some point.

I love jazz and pop rock and country. I grew up listening to Michael Jackson, Whitney Houston, Def Leppard, AC/DC, Anne Murray - if I hear something really great... I want to be a part of it.

I grew up listening to everything. And rock and roll has always been a big, big part of it - as big a part of what I do as any other type of music.

Growing up, I listened to a lot of everything - I fell in love with music, when I discovered people like Lauryn Hill and Tracy Chapman, people whose voices I could really feel, people with a lot of soul. That's what I'm drawn to as a musician: Anybody that has their own voice and their own point of view.

I didn't want to be one of the Beach Boys or one of the Bonzo Dog Doo-Dah band. I mean, we appreciated that music. But I didn't want to grow a beard to look like Roy Wood just because I liked him.

Music is my first love, as it's in my blood.

The very first show I ever saw was The Judds, and that influenced me to not play country music.

Once I tried to find myself as a musician and a composer, I went back and saw that there was something special about Puerto Rican music. I knew that before, but had never sat down and thought about it. The more I learned about it, the more it found its way into the music I was writing.

I've always had a close connection to both rock and classical music.

We always thought it strange that nobody was up on that stage playing soul stuff. Maybe people were playing it in their garages, like us, but they always reverted to pure rock when they got on stage.

Music is in my DNA!

I really haven't strayed too far, musically, from my roots.

My real musical discovery started when I was 10 with Stevie Wonder and the Jackson 5, and acts that I connected with because they were young when they were doing it, like me. Then I kind of came into my own a couple of years later; I found new artists that shaped my musical landscape. For instance, Kings of Leon played a big part in that.

At the end of the day I want to be the guy who experienced music in all type of ways, with hip-hop being the roots of it.

I grew up seeing my parents perform and sing, and I just always wanted to be singing, too. Music has always been my deepest passion and what I felt most connected to.

Growing up, music was an important part of my childhood. I see it being just as important in my children and all children's growth and development, and in a parent's connection with their children.

I had been inspired by an organ player named Earl Grant, who played organ and piano together. My mom took me to see him. So I went home, put my piano and organ together, too.

I'm continuing to learn more about music - it's an ocean, and you can never really say that you know everything. I'm grateful that I'm still living and making music among the greats.

I've always loved music, but I never really played anything. After 'Walk the Line' and learning to play guitar, and having that sense of performing, I think that certainly opened the door for me, for music.