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" My older sister encouraged me from early on and bought me one of the first guitars I had. She listened to all of the crappy songs that I wrote when I was 8 years old and encouraged me to keep doing it. "

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" As a child I always had a sense of social conditions and political situations. I think it had to do with the fact that my mother was always discussing things with my sister and me - also because I read a lot. "

Tracy Chapman

Child

Think

Sister

" I often write either really early in the morning, or really late at night. "

" One of the reasons I chose Tufts is that they have one of the best veterinary schools in the country. Since I was six years old, I wanted to be a veterinarian. "

" Some things remain fragments, just the lyrics and melodies or a line or two or a verse. "

" I can't think of anything worse, really, than to try to live up to someone else's expectations of what you should be. You don't make art by consensus. "

" I found myself in the middle of a race riot when I was about 14 years old, and I found someone pointing a gun at me and telling me to run or they'd shoot me. "

Tracy Chapman

Run

Gun

" I think it's important, if you are an artist, to use your music to stand up for what you believe in. "

" Everyone is looking for connections between the songs. I don't usually approach a record as a concept. There's no overriding theme I'm trying to represent. It's all about the individual songs. "

" I won't get into it any more than to say that there are parts of me in all the songs that I write. "

Tracy Chapman

Write

Than

" I think religion played a huge part in Bush's re-election. "

" That's what everyone should do with their lives: stand up for what they believe in or try to do some good in the world. I don't think artists have a greater responsibility than anyone else. "

" I never assumed I would have that commercial success, so it was a total surprise. And honestly, I never assumed that it would ever happen again. "

" As you might imagine, I'm approached by lots of organizations and lots of people who want me to support their various charitable efforts in some way. And I look at those requests, and I basically try to do what I can. "

Tracy Chapman

People

Look

" Growing up in Cleveland, I learned about singing from my mother, who had once sung professionally and who admired Mahalia Jackson and Aretha Franklin. "

" We do need to think about how we have security - everyone has a right to that - but we also need to think about how we maintain civil rights and personal freedom. "

" I started playing and writing songs when I was eight. "

" You need to keep something for yourself. As a writer, I feel that even more strongly. I feel like I need to be able to freely observe the world. That's the way I like to move through the world; I don't need to be the focus of attention. If I am, it impairs my ability to write and to do what I do. "

" I dressed up as a veterinarian for a Halloween costume party. I had the lab coat. I got a couple of stuffed animals for patients and put bandages on them. "

" So much has happened to obscure the dialogue about race and about gender and discrimination in general, especially where those things touch on economics. "

" Songwriting is a very mysterious process. It feels like creating something from nothing. It's something I don't feel like I really control. "

Tracy Chapman

Nothing

Feel

" My first record was almost not my first record. "

" There have been some gains made in terms of more equality for women in the workplace and in the way the legal system deals with issues of violence against women. "

" Stand up for yourself and fight for your right to be the artist that you want to be. There's plenty of pressure from outside; people tell you how to dress and how to sing or what to sing, but I always felt like if I'm going to fail or succeed, I want to do it on my own terms. "

" There's a time and place for everything, and my focus is music. So that's what I prefer to spend most of my time doing, and not talk about making music. "

" I decided to do whatever I could to make sure the business side of music didn't intrude on the creative part. "

" We all must live our lives always feeling, always thinking the moment has arrived. "

" I picked up the guitar at 11, but even before then, I was writing songs on the organ. "

Tracy Chapman

Writing

Even

" Honestly, I think, as an artist, it's everything that's in your life that informs what you do. So, obviously, growing up in Cleveland has played a big role in how I see the world. "

" There are good reasons for being in jail - for protesting. "

" People's real hopes and dreams can be distorted and misdirected and packaged until you're not sure what you really want or what you even really need. "