Race and Music Quotes

Presley is country music, white music. Jazz is black music - it was invented by the blacks in New Orleans. And I'm really a jazz singer. I was impressed with Elvis - he was the handsomest guy I ever met in my life, and a very nice person, too. But the music doesn't impress me.

I mean, there's plenty of artists who are making R&B music, but because of their ethnicity, it's considered something else.

One of the reasons I didn't ever pursue a career - in the music world if you're black or mixed, you need to be able to belt a song or else you're not a singer, you know?

Our songs did not transcend being R&B hits. They were R&B hits that white kids were attracted to. And if people bought it, it became rock & roll. That's marketing. Why couldn't it still be R&B? The bass pattern didn't change. The song didn't change. It was still 'Yakety Yak' and 'Searchin'.'

I was a black singer with a white voice, a perfect pop voice.

To most white people, jazz means black and jazz means dirt, and that's not what I play. I play black classical music.

I'd been watching documentaries about early rock where white artists took 'race records' from blues and soul musicians to achieve mass appeal. I wanted to flip that and do an EP covering only white artists.

I like to make music, I like rap music. Even if I'm white, I support that music. If I want to support it or any other white kid wants to support it more power to them.

If I were not a black artist but I was still singing, playing guitar, and singing ballads that are spiritual and cerebral, I'd be easier to market because people accept that from white female singer-songwriters faster.

Jazz is a white term to define black people. My music is black classical music.

English music is white - it evades everything.

If I was a white rapper, the bar for me would be Eminem. Of course his white skin helped him excel to heights that a lot of other rappers couldn't, but he still was talented. People gravitated towards him because of his skills. He stood the test of time.

When people say Jerry Lee Lewis invented rock n' roll, they forget Little Richard. People talk about Elvis Presley and forget he was singing black music. I don't blame Elvis. It was the music business figuring it could make more money from this music if it weren't presented from the original source.

That's why I called my record Devil Without a Cause - I'm a white boy who's so sick of hearing that white kids are going to steal rap.

If you are a soul singer, you are a soul singer. If you are a heavy metal singer, then you are a heavy metal singer. What's color got to do with it? I don't go around thinking, 'I sing soul music and I'm white.' I just sing the way I feel.