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The audience is like my instrument. It’s not just me up there, it’s collaborative.

Bobby McFerrin

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
BOBBY MCFERRIN

Children Life Responsibility
You keep going forward, fearful or not, living from moment to moment. That’s how life is.
BOBBY MCFERRIN

Fearful Forward Keep Life
The audience is like my instrument. It’s not just me up there, it’s collaborative.
BOBBY MCFERRIN

Audience Instruments Performing
I want to write a book of poetry, as well as children’s stories.
BOBBY MCFERRIN

Book Children Writing
The voice gets to the soul of a person more than any other instrument. Because it’s the voice. It sings talks, it cries, it laughs, it squeals, it barks, it shouts it whispers, There is no other instrument that can do that. We’re born with it.
BOBBY MCFERRIN

Laughing Soul Voice
When I was figuring out how to perform solo, I wanted to move back and forth between bass riffs, melody, and harmony, so I often used sounds instead of — or alongside — the words of a song.
BOBBY MCFERRIN

Alongside Figuring Harmony Perform Song
If I stand there, appreciating the world around me as full of amazing sounds and the possibility of new ones,
BOBBY MCFERRIN

People Teaching Thinking
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.
BOBBY MCFERRIN

Actually Almost Fought Idea Suppose
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,
BOBBY MCFERRIN

Joy Real Thinking
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.
BOBBY MCFERRIN

Language Recognize Responded Sound Talking
Music is so powerful, it needs to be used for some kind of redeeming work. To lift peoples spirits, to lift their souls.
BOBBY MCFERRIN

Needs Powerful Soul
I use the audience as my color palette, my instrument.
BOBBY MCFERRIN

Color Music Use
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.
BOBBY MCFERRIN

Depths Grace Joy Place Real Sense
One song may be Bach, the next blues, a song from TV, or a nursery rhyme or jazz piece.
BOBBY MCFERRIN

Nursery One Piece Rhyme Song Television
Don’t just play the licks you know. We’re all improvising all the time – it’s good to recognize that and embrace it.
BOBBY MCFERRIN

Embrace Good Improve Play Recognize
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 MCFERRIN

Prayer Singing Spiritual

The audience is like my instrument. It’s not just me up there, it’s collaborative.

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The audience is like my instrument. It’s not just me up there, it’s collaborative.

Related Topics

Popular Authors

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