John Zorn Quotes

Usually, I create tunes that are fragmented. I think the biggest obstacle for people with their creativity is that they feel they have to sit down and create this finished, polished product.

There's an element to songwriting that I can't explain, that comes from somewhere else. I can't explain that dividing line between nothing and something that happens within a song, where you have absolutely nothing, and then suddenly you have something. It's like the origin of the universe.

The songs I've written that are the strongest, I'm like: 'I don't know where that came from. It just kind of popped out.' You feel you can't take a whole lot of credit for it. I didn't purposefully will it into existence.

You can never tell when an artist really will take up someone's work and work with it happily.

I hardly ever go into the studio with a work complete in my head. It emerges from communal activity.

There really is a certain magic that happens when you're in the studio. And it's important in life to feel that magic: to feel that there is something greater moving all this along.

You can't manufacture inspiration, so a lot of it is still a waiting game for me. There's still a lot of mystery to songwriting. I don't have a method that I can go back to - they either come or they don't.

I don't know where my songs come from... If I knew, I'd know too much, more than we are allowed on this plane.

Anytime I have an idea, I'll make sure that I put it down so that when we do sit down to write an album, I don't have to dream it all out of thin air. I don't have to be creative on the spur of the moment, or spontaneously artistic. I just take advantage of whenever creativity strikes.

If at noon you sit down and there's just silence or blank tape, in an hour if you have a song, that didn't exist an hour ago. Now it exists and it might exist for a long time. There's something empowering about that.

I believe sometimes we aren't always in charge of everything that we do creatively. We submit to things as we're going on our own journey.

I'm not the sort of chap who can sit down and write music. When it comes, I'm happy.

Hearing about a visual artist's approach can change the way you think about songwriting.

Things don't happen in a vacuum, and artists don't make work in a vacuum.

It's not that I'm trying to write another '7 Years' or a new version of 'Mama Said.' Songs just kind of come out of nowhere, and you need to catch them when they do.

I really admire songwriters or any kind of writer, painter or artist that says, "I'm going to get up at 8 o'clock in the morning and spend this time to this time creating." I do that sometimes, but the songs I like the best come as gifts from somewhere. It's almost like you didn't do anything, like you can't take credit for it because you sat down and the melody and words came out.

One musician listens to another musician, and you get inspired and then you do your thing, but it's yours.

I don't choose what I compose. It chooses me.

I can't legislate a song into being; it just will not happen for me.

I live a normal life. But I'm always thinking about what I'm going to do next, musically. 'Do I need a fresh producer? What was Peter Gabriel doing when he was 32?'

I think good artists know when they're on a roll, and they recognize when lightning is striking. It's a very fortunate thing to have that inspiration and not to overanalyze it or mess with it; you just follow it if you love what you do.

We all love to sing, and when we sit down to write a song I think it kind of shows itself to us.

But inspiration? - That's when you come home from abroad and are asked: Well, have you found inspiration? - and fortunately you haven't. But the impressions sink in, of course, and may emerge later: None of us has invented the house; that was done many thousands of years ago.

Most people wait for the muse to turn up. That's terribly unreliable. I have to sit down and pursue the muse by attempting to work.

No, no, the songs write themselves, almost.