Get QuoteDark Inspirational Quotes App

" I think my intention was there, and my love for the music was apparent. And there are very few singers who get up and desire to take the kinds of risks that jazz musicians routinely need to be taking. "

Kurt Elling

Musicians

Music

Risks

Related Quotes:

" Listening to something without being present is different from being there in the flesh. "

" I don't want to take it easy. "

" I haven't been afraid of John Coltrane or Miles Davis or Bill Evans or Wayne Shorter or Herbie Hancock. Why would I be afraid of the Beatles? "

" That's the thing: There are so many art songs in jazz. It's a much more rich experience for the singer than people think. "

" The idea is to be unrestrained by categories. "

Kurt Elling

Categories

Idea

" You work very hard on the lyrics. Getting them to fit the contours of improvised melodies. "

" I really thought I was gonna have a straight gig. But these jazz musicians put their arms around me time and again and said, 'Hey, young fella, you're one of us. Come with us.' That's a big deal when you're young and looking for your way in the world. "

" People just want to dig; they want to dance. They don't want to work all through the night, and neither do I. I like getting 'out there,' but communication should be occurring on more levels than heavy-laden philosophical. "

" I've tried to educate myself in the world and what's beautiful and what has meaning and is lasting. Then I just follow my intuition and see how it fits. "

" Audiences have taught me how to sing better and entertain better. "

Kurt Elling

Sing

Taught

" There's a wide spectrum of possibilities in how to deliver a song. "

" I was very lucky that more experienced musicians allowed me to caterwaul until I figured out what it was really about. "

" Sometimes people have this notion that improvisation is simply intuitive leaping into the unknown. "

" I try to sleep as much as I can. I drink a lot of water. I practice consistently and just try to be ready for the gig. "

" Chicago has a burly, action-oriented but still self-assured and relaxed confidence to its stride. The city has a lot of wide-open space and all the possibilities that suggests. There's a lot of horizontal grandeur here. "

" The great jazz and jazz-influenced singers carry themselves with a certain panache and a certain elegance and, for lack of a better word, self-confidence. "

" It's easy to get tired of religious fundamentalists. They're such a bore. They have no sense of mystery. It's a drag, man. "

" Of course we all know when music's too much in the head, and we define our greatest players by the way they are able to communicate directly from their emotional selves. "

" I don't really have a more intellectualized approach. After the fact, I can sure talk about stuff a lot - but when I make decisions, I really just follow what sounds good to me. "

Kurt Elling

Decisions

I Can

" I'm a guy who has more slapstick than Joe Cool moments in his day, so I'm not taking myself so seriously. "

" I try to stick with things that I can sing with honesty. "

" If you're going to be transparent, you're going to have to let the music come that wants to come. "

" It helps me to learn things in different languages, even if it's just phonetically, and to make myself vulnerable to other audiences by trying to reflect back to them the genius of their own cultures, and to do that, oftentimes, in new jazz settings, new arrangements. It's a way to show respect. "

" A lot of the commercial world wants to bank in on the cachet that jazz brings. "

" You don't show respect to Frank Sinatra and his great example by trying to sound exactly like him. You show it by sounding exactly like you, and that's the way jazz has always progressed as an art form. "

" My intellect was quickened at divinity school, and my abilities to discern were strengthened, and that's always valuable. "

" Part of my joy as a singer is to give gifts to people, and one way I try to connect to them is to add something in French or German or whatever. "

" When improvisation is properly applied, it is compositional thinking, sped way up. "

Kurt Elling

Thinking

Way

" Every record is a gate of a certain kind for me. "