Amanda Shires Quotes

I am always happy up a ladder with a paintbrush in my hand. And I wish I had more time to spend in the garden - not least because I get good ideas for writing when I'm out there.

I like listening to ambient music, especially in very scenic places because I think it allows for the most freedom of thought.

The world is full of poetry. The air is living with its spirit; and the waves dance to the music of its melodies, and sparkle in its brightness.

Sometimes it works. Sometimes I feel like playing 'Hospital'. Sometimes I feel like playing 'Pablo Picasso'. I've been playing a lot lately. I do it as long as I feel like it.

I think the most important thing about music is the sense of escape.

I go to the ocean to calm down, to reconnect with the creator, to just be happy.

I used to love going to the garden centre as a kid. It made me feel relaxed.

I get on my porch with my guitar, look at my trees, and write a song.

I would take my guitar to college and sit for hours in the hills humming to myself.

I never sang for a Grammy, for money, for fame. That's my whole purpose for singing: for people, for the fans.

I just want to be able to play and make people feel good with what I do. When you're thinking that way, anything can happen. And, usually, what happens is good.

I live in a rural residential area. It's a great place for a walk. I'm at my happiest when I'm listening to my iPod while walking around where my feet take me.

I love being outside - that's where I'm the happiest.

If I hadn't been a singer, I might have been a photographer or an artist. But it's singing I love. I sing all the time, and I feel really good that I've expressed myself.

I'm still blowing alright, and I still enjoy it which is the main thing.

Oh, my God, this amazing cool breeze is coming through my window and the sun is shining. I'm happy.

I'd listen to all the stuff that was going on around me and drift off into my fantasies about it. My fantasies have fuelled all the songs I've ever written.

After I left the Pumpkins, I went home and just sat around. I have a studio in my basement, and I found myself writing all these songs, just taking advantage of the relaxed situation. I wrote about 30 songs in about 30 days.

You wind up creating from silence, like painting a picture on a blank canvas that could bring tears to somebody's eyes. As songwriters, our blank canvas is silence. Then we write a song from an idea that can change somebody's life. Songwriting is the closest thing to magic that we could ever experience. That's why I love songwriting.

I started to write as a child as soon as I could read, or even before, when my mother read me Beatrix Potter at bedtime. Writing seemed to me to be the only sensible way to live and be happy.

Music is a moral law. It gives soul to the universe, wings to the mind, flight to the imagination, and charm and gaiety to life and to everything.

It was my 16th birthday - my mom and dad gave me my Goya classical guitar that day. I sat down, wrote this song, and I just knew that that was the only thing I could ever really do - write songs and sing them to people.

Singing was my first passion. Whenever I sing, I'm always so happy.

I read a lot; fiction and non-fiction are the mediums I find most edifying and inspiring. I watch movies and listen to music and take lots and lots of walks. Nature is a nice reset button for me, it's how I get a lot of thinking done.

I believe it is in my nature to dance by virtue of the beat of my heart, the pulse of my blood and the music in my mind.