Quotes of All Topics . Occasions . Authors
The last thing I want is to walk into my house after a long day and see all the Grammys and awards. It would make me feel weird.
What breaks my heart is suffering of any kind. Too often, our world is divisive and cruel where it needs to be uniting and loving.
If I want to be alone, some place I can write, I can read, I can pray, I can cry, I can do whatever I want - I go to the bathroom.
I'm the cofounder of Keep a Child Alive. We provide medicine for families affected by HIV and AIDS in places like Africa and India.
For me, doing a show, the excitement of singing live, and the possibility that you're not gonna be perfect - that's the thrill of it.
I don't have a ton of friends, but the friends I have are great ones. I don't have huge family, but the family I have is a great one.
I'd rather believe in my own choice and see it all go wrong than do something I'm not fully convinced of and later feel guilty about it.
I lived with my mom in a really small apartment. My bedroom was like in the living room. That's why I still love to sleep on couches now.
I have solid decent people around me, and I believe that is all it is, because you will get destroyed if you have people bringing you down.
When I was younger, studying classical music, I really had to put in the time. Three hours a day is not even nice - you have to put in six.
I have my mother who is an Irish-Italian, and my father who is African, so I have the taste buds of an Italian and the spice of an African.
I know people who've gone to jail. It don't mean you stop loving them! They deservin' love just as much in there, and maybe they needin' it more.
My music comes from many, many, many places. My emotions, my feelings, my thoughts, and conversations I have with people I know who influence me.
I was worried that one day, 40 years from now, I would look back and wouldn't be able to remember the details of my life, so I've written them all down.
I love Bono. I really respect what he has done for Africa and how he has used his fame to do good in the world. I hope I can do half as much in my life.
I'm inspired by artists and musicians. There are so many wonderful and talented people in the world. I love discovering new music, new writers, or new art.
I grew up in the middle of everything. I walked the streets alone, I rode the trains alone, I came home at three in the morning alone; that was what I did.
I love my heritage! I have my mother, who is an Irish-Italian, and my father who is African, so I have the taste buds of an Italian and the spice of an African.
I definitely want to act, but I also want to score movies, and I have this idea to fuse classical music with other styles that would give it a different perception.
I grew up around the theatre. My mother is an actress. I would fall asleep on tons of theatre chairs. It's in my blood; it's in my spirit and my fabric of who I am.
Music is funny. I shouldn't even ever talk about music, because you can have all the ideas in your head, and it never goes exactly the way that you think it's gonna go.
A Minor is one of my all-time favorite keys to play in. It's a very moody key, and also 'A' is the first letter of my name. It just represents the songs through my eyes.
I've learned that while I'd be a fool not to stay open to the advice and experiences of the smart, amazing people in my life, I also need to listen to what I have to say.
I think I grew up really fast; I grew up in this really fast-paced business, and I never understood what it meant to take a break or take time off or recover, and I paid for it.
When I'm on stage, my interaction with the audience is something that really makes me come alive. It's a feeling like no other. The energy of the crowd fuels something new inside.
The desire to play has always been in me. I remember my first experience at about four or five of really dying to sing and dying to play that came from no one telling me to do so.
We have the potential to help people out of poverty, out of disease, out of slavery and out of conflict. Too often, we turn the other way because we think there's nothing we can do.
The element of fire to me is very powerful because of what it symbolizes, how it symbolizes a strength. It symbolizes something that's unstoppable. You can't get through it, you know.
Everybody goes through their life in different ways. I definitely am having my journey. It evolves and changes. At some moments, I feel totally off center and trying to find my way back.
To be able to help a 13-year-old kid from the Bronx follow her dreams just by letting her know she's not forgotten in this crazy world - that's why I got involved with Frum Tha Ground Up.
I feel more like I'm a person who has so much to offer in different capacities that it would be a danger for me not to give myself a chance to spread my wings in all different directions.
Mozart would play a counterpart with his left hand while using his right to mock it. It was blue, dark, shadowy - and it made me feel something. That's when I realized music was inside me.
My mixed-race background made me a broad person, able to relate to different cultures. But any woman of colour, even a mixed colour, is seen as black in America. So that's how I regard myself.
How terrible would it have been if I had come out with some watered-down version of who I am? People fell in love with the real me, and I still feel blessed that that was how the journey began.
I am able to hang with the hardest, the baddest, the worst, and I'm able to hang with the most proper and be at ease. I'm able to hang with any skin colour, any belief. I just fit in everywhere.
I think you are who you are, and your kids will see who you are. So you'd better be a good person, because they are going to see it, and that's going to shape them. They are going to become you.
I feel like the majority of the fear that I had or that we have we hold from other people. They're like people that we trust; they're their fears. All of a sudden we think that they're our fears.
Most times, your blessings are also your curses. And for me, I have this ability to express myself so clearly with pen and paper, but when it comes to expressing myself verbally, I put up a big wall.
My parents weren't married. It wasn't like my dad up and left. I maintained a steady relationship with my grandparents. My dad's mother is my nana, and I'm closer to her than almost anybody in this world.
When I was a kid I'd practise Chopin on piano - and I love Chopin! He's my dawg! Then I'd go out on the stoop and blast the radio. I'm from New York, the concrete jungle. Hip-hop influenced me from day one.
When I was a kid, I'd practise Chopin on piano - and I love Chopin! He's my dawg! Then I'd go out on the stoop and blast the radio. I'm from New York, the concrete jungle. Hip-hop influenced me from day one.
Adam Levine and I remade the Rolling Stones' classic Wild Horses, and it is right up my alley, that whole style. It has a style of its own but still stays very true to the classic arrangement, and I love it.
When I was first learning songs, I'd have a favorite song, and I'd take the chords and twist them around. I'd learn the chords and then play them backward. That was my first experimenting with writing a song.
I really appreciate Frank Ocean's lyrical style, I appreciate the way that he can kind of draw you into this personal space, but it's still lyrical. It's almost poetic, in a way, but it's very personal at the same time.
From the beginning, I've had to juggle and weigh the silly things people say - and I've learnt that they're meaningless, and they're mostly inaccurate. So I don't worry about it, because there's nothin' for me to deal with.
I feel the presence of a higher power. I believe that what you give is what you get. It's universal law. I believe in the power of prayer and of words. I've learned that when you predict that negative things will happen, they do.
I've always valued the input of the people I love. So in the past, whenever I'd make a decision - what to wear to an event, whether to pursue a job opportunity - I'd consult those closest to me, like my mother, husband, or manager.
Once people see this 'Unplugged,' I just want them to feel the spontaneity, to feel passionate... I want you to see another side of me, that's free, and feel where my head is, where whatever happens, happens. I want you to feel inspired.
I don't think even when you find a person, you can be completely honest, ever. There's still pieces of you that you don't give away. I do believe you always need that place where it's just you, your thoughts, no one else's judgment or anything.
A lot of times I watch TV and I watch film and there's so many things I'd love to talk about that I feel don't get the opportunity to be shown. Sometimes things become very stereotypical and one-sided, and I feel like it's such a colorful world.