Musical Origins Quotes

Well, you know, the original banjos were all handmade instruments. Gourd - it would be made with gourds and whatever, you know, materials would have been around. And, you know, first hundred years of its existence, the banjo's known as a plantation instrument, as a black instrument, you know?

... so much of what we do now started in 1954 at Sun Records in Memphis Tennessee ... those guys were inventing that stuff (Rock & Roll) ... you can really tell on some tracks ... they were actually afraid at times of what they were playing. But Rock & Roll definitely didn't come before that time; it started right there

Poetry speaks most effectively and inclusively (whether in free or formal verse) when it recognizes its connection - without apology - to its musical and ritualistic origins.

My formative years were in Houston. I was in middle school, and everyone was dropping the last half of their names and adding an 'o' to the end. My little crew that I had, we were an all-female rap group, and everyone had an 'o' at the end of their name. I was Lisso. Then this dude started getting lazy with it, saying Lizzo.

I never knew I was a songwriter. I didn't even know I was a singer. My parents just got me a guitar 'cause my uncle told them to get me one, and I started fooling with it.

When I first started playing music in 1955, there was just a small body of people that knew it. It was a very esoteric type of thing.

Musicals spring forth from minstrelsy, vaudeville, melodramas; it was all these things combined to create the form.

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

The human voice deployed to recite the Vedas and later aid the temple dancers was paramount before any instruments emerged.

You know the drum was the first instrument besides the human voice.

Rock n' Roll came from the slaves singing gospel in the fields. Their lives were hell and they used music to lift out of it, to take them away. That's what rock n' roll should do - take you to a better place.

I was writing poetry, and the Mountain Goats was an outgrowth of that.

I was very small when I started making music. I think the first song might have been when I was, like, in grade one, maybe? It was really ironic, cause it was a kid talking about taking time with growing up.

I like back-stories to music.

I always had an eye toward the stage for the story of Hamilton's life, but I began with the idea of a concept album, the way Andrew Lloyd Webber's 'Evita' and 'Jesus Christ Superstar' were albums before they were musicals.

As a kid, on the cotton fields, I had this tune in my head. I hummed it and sang it. It was the same melody as 'When A Man Loves A Woman.' I could never, ever forget it.

I decided to build up my band in Buffalo because Buffalo was where I had originally built up my own musical strength.

I'm very interested in music and where these sounds of Western music come from.

I was writing songs as a kid about leprechauns and Catwoman and teapots - whatever it is that little girls wanna sing about. The first song I wrote was called 'Kitten.'

I know this sounds weird, but I honestly believe music comes from the universe. Inspiration comes from the universe, and you drag it into your mind.

My own personal theory is that all popular music, in whatever form it is, to me, it all comes from Africa. Whether it's filtered through America or whatever - African-American. But I still think there's something in that roots music that's very, very African, and I think that's what unites people.

I started out really young, when I was four, five, six, writing poems, before I could play an instrument. I was writing about things when I was eight or 10 years old that I hadn't lived long enough to experience. That's why I also believe in reincarnation, that we were put here with ideas to pass around.

You don't have to play the blues to play rock 'n' roll, but that's where, somewhere along the line, your influences came from. I mean, I don't care where you got it from. If you got it from Eric Clapton, he got it from the blues.

It's probably the first type of music we had, rhythm, whether it's poetry or tapping.

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.