Soulful Singing Quotes

When I began looking into the Carter catalog and came across 'Will My Mother Know Me There,' it seemed like such a joyful number and such a song of the spirit that I could hear them all singing it together.

I just love the sound of a black woman's voice.

When I sing songs, I love to put emotion into it. I want people to feel what I feel and just disappear for a moment.

When Billie Holiday sings a song, I hear the song, but I always hear her and her truth.

Audiences like their blues singers to be miserable.

I always loved Little Anthony and the Imperials. They were like the precursors of the Temptations. I loved their music.

To sing along with Stevie Wonder, you had to make your voice do things it was not accustomed to doing.

The best vocalists I can think of are female. There is no singer I can think of who can touch Ella Fitzgerald. And when Billie Holiday sings, she's merciless about it. Her voice has just this immaculate sadness - even in happy songs, there was something that was so broken about it.

I want to sing like Aretha Franklin. Before her I wanted the technical ability of Ella Fitzgerald.

I'm very soulful. I grew up singing in church. When I sing a song, I like to feel what I'm singing.

Occasionally, a great band would come along, like Blondie or OutKast who could be pop and bring interesting ideas into the mainstream at the same time. That's now gone, because of this weird mutation of pop, rap, R&B, bad rave, and supposedly soulful singing on top of it.

Any musical person who has never heard a Negro congregation under the spell of religious fervor sing these old songs has missed one of the most thrilling emotions which the human heart may experience.

The whole basis of my singing is feeling. Unless I feel something, I can't sing.

When I hear a singer, I want them to be passionate and intense, and soul singers like Otis Redding and Wilson Pickett always seemed to do exactly that.

Singing from the heart is my only goal.

I love early blues like Bessie Smith, Muddy Waters, and Howlin' Wolf. I listened to the way these people sang, and it was just beautiful - straight from the soul. That, for me, was an inspiration.

I am not a trained singer, but I always sing from my heart.

When I heard Aretha, I could feel her emotional delivery so clearly. It came from down deep within. That's what I wanted to do.

Guys like Clyde McPhatter used to sing their tail ends off!

Ladies love a soppy lyric. There's a real winner in 'Carry You Home.'

Like all soul singers, I grew up singing in church but sometimes I would leave early and sit in the car listening to gospel band, The Blind Boys of Alabama. Hearing their lead singer Clarence made me connect the idea of church and show business and see how I could make a career singing music that stirred the soul.

I think I'm a soulful singer.

I was told all my life to sing like Aretha Franklin, or Adele, cover myself with black clothing and show more soul, sing bigger.

When I sing, it's the most solitary state: just me, and the microphone, and the holy spirit. It's not about notes or scales, it's all about emotion.

People think the blues is sad. They hear people moaning and such. That's not the blues. That's just somebody singing slow...The blues is about truth-telling.