Etta James Quotes and Sayings - Page 1
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“When I sing for myself, I probably sing for anyone who has any kind of hurt, any kind of bad feelings, good feelings, ups and downs, highs and lows, that kind of thing.”
-- Etta James -
“My mother always told me, even if a song has been done a thousand times, you can still bring something of your own to it. I'd like to think I did that.”
-- Etta James -
“I want a Sunday kind of love A love to last past Saturday night And I’d like to know it’s more than love at first sight”
-- Etta James -
“I wanna show that gospel, country, blues, rhythm and blues, jazz, rock 'n' roll are all just really one thing. Those are the American music and that is the American culture.”
-- Etta James -
“At last my love has come along. My lonely days are over and life is like a song.”
-- Etta James -
“That's where it begins and ends for me and these songs were the ones that touched me the deepest. It was like I was laying hold of some part of me that I didn't even know was there until I let it out.”
-- Etta James -
“And as I started reaching deeper I realized that most of the blues of that day was done by men. Women just didn't have the nerve.”
-- Etta James -
“My mother was a jazz fanatic and she wanted me to play the piano so I could play jazz tunes. I wish I had learned but I was too busy getting into trouble!”
-- Etta James -
“You can't fake this music. You might be a great singer or a great musician but, in the need, that's got nothing to do with it. It's how you connect to the songs and to the history behind them.”
-- Etta James -
“What happens is, when I perform, I'm somewhere else. I go back in time and get in touch with who I really am. I forget my troubles, my worries.”
-- Etta James -
“Most of the songs I sing have that blues feeling in it. They have that sorry feeling. And I don't know what I'm sorry about. I don't.”
-- Etta James -
“Jazz took too much discipline. You have to come in at the right place, which is different than me singing the blues, where I can sing, 'Oh, baby,' if there's a pause in the melody. With jazz, you better leave that space open, or put in something real cool.”
-- Etta James -
“It's not about battling the original artists when I record these songs, it's about paying tribute to them.”
-- Etta James -
“The two things you can't fake are good food and good music”
-- Etta James -
“The only time that I am really truly happy—when I feel at my best—is when I'm on the stage.”
-- Etta James -
“See, I don't like places where people can't dance - don't like clubs or theatres where a bunch of bourgeois people sit around tip, tip, tipping their fingers.”
-- Etta James -
“People that can't stand to listen to the blues, they've got to be phonies.”
-- Etta James -
“They said that Etta James is still vulgar. I said, Oh, how dare them say I'm still vulgar. I'm vulgar because I dance in the chair. What would they want me to do? Want me to just be still or something like that? I've got to do something.”
-- Etta James -
“In some ways, it's my rage that keeps me going,”
-- Etta James -
“People always say 'Etta, you know what your problem is? You're neither fish nor fowl. There is no place to rack you.' When I would go in a record shop, you might find one or two records by me in different stacks.”
-- Etta James -
“Long as I was riding in a big Cadillac and dressed nice and had plenty of food, that's all I cared about.”
-- Etta James -
“I'm not starry eyed, and I'm not money crazy.”
-- Etta James -
“I really turned into, you know, the real street kid. I was kind of like a runaway, but I had a mother, you know what I mean, and I had a place to stay.”
-- Etta James -
“Even as a little child, I've always had that comedian kind of attitude.”
-- Etta James -
“Once you lose the weight, you're really anxious to eat healthy.”
-- Etta James -
“It's the same thing now. When I go onstage the young people scream and holler as much as the older generation.”
-- Etta James
