Music is still part of my spiritual life. Sometimes I sing my prayers. When I get audiences singing, I hope I’m helping them feel connected to something beyond themselves.
BOBBY MCFERRINImprovisation means coming to the situation without rigid expectations or preconceptions. The key to improvisation is motion.
More Bobby McFerrin Quotes
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One song may be Bach, the next blues, a song from TV, or a nursery rhyme or jazz piece.
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I use the audience as my color palette, my instrument.
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I actually fought the idea for a while because it seemed almost too radical, but it became obvious what I was supposed to be doing.
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Don’t just play the licks you know. We’re all improvising all the time – it’s good to recognize that and embrace it.
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I like a very dark house, just black. I sit there and just think. Once I’m still and quiet inside, I’ll begin. It’s very personal; it has to be.
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I couldn’t do anything without faith. I couldn’t open up my eyes, I couldn’t walk, I couldn’t speak, I couldn’t sing.
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If I sing “you broke my heart, you left me flat,” everyone knows exactly what that means – they know the story. But if I sing a line that’s plaintive or wailing, people can experience their own set of emotions and their own story.
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Part of our responsibility as parents, as adults, is to set examples for children. But we have to like children in order to be really happy fulfilled adults
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Improvisation is the courage to move from one note to the next.
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I want them to have this sense of real, real joy from the depths of their being. Because I think when you take them to that place, then you open up a place where grace can come in.
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Here’s a little song I wrote. You might want to sing it note for note. Don’t worry, be happy.
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If I stand there, appreciating the world around me as full of amazing sounds and the possibility of new ones,
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When we listen to improvisational jazz, or solo classical violinists, the way they phrase and inflect melodies feels vocal, like they’re talking to us.
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I found that if I sang a line using the consonants, vowels, shadings, and inflection we recognize as human language sounds, people responded as if I were talking to them.
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Improvisation means coming to the situation without rigid expectations or preconceptions. The key to improvisation is motion.
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Miles Davis turned his back to the audience when he came out on stage, and he offended people. But, he wasn’t there to entertain; he was all about the music. I kind of do that.
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Remembering that life can be full of surprises is useful in any part of your life.
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I bury my mind in my book, the Bible. Every morning it’s the first thing that I do. I’ve been doing it for years and years.
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This is what I want everyone to experience at the end of my concert… everyone has this sense of rejoicing. I don’t want them to be blown away by what I do,
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You keep going forward, fearful or not, living from moment to moment. That’s how life is.
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I think play and joy and feeling good deserve more of our time. I don’t see why adults are supposed to grow out of those things.
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I want to write a book of poetry, as well as children’s stories.
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It’s not that I don’t love the song. My songs are like my children: some you want around and some you want to send off to college as soon as possible.
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I’d actually been making my living as an organist with bands since I was probably 15 or 16 years old, and then as a senior in high school I put together a jazz quintet called The Bobby Mack Jazz Quintet.
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You can try a new way of singing a song you’ve performed for years, a new way of showing your family your love for them, or a new recipe.
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If I have a mission it’s to make everyone who comes to my concerts leave feeling a heightened sense of freedom to play, sing, and enjoy themselves.
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