Etta James Quotes

63 quotes in 744 categories

• 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…
• The music was thunder and joy. Lightning bolts of happiness and praise, foot-stomping, dance-shouting, good-feeling singing from the soul.
• My mother always wanted me to be a jazz singer, but I always wanted to be raunchy,
• It's the same thing now. When I go onstage the young people scream and holler as much as the older generation.
• Once you lose the weight, you're really anxious to eat healthy.
• Even as a little child, I've always had that comedian kind of attitude.
• 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 was a sloppy kid, wanted to be just wild.
• I'm not a bourgeois person, never will be.
• I'm not starry eyed, and I'm not money crazy.
• It feels so good to be happy.
• Long as I was riding in a big Cadillac and dressed nice and had plenty of food, that's all I cared about.
• My mother used to play nothing but Billie Holiday.
• Johnny Guitar... just one of my favorite singers of all time. I met him when we were both on the road with Johnny Otis in…
• 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…
• When I look out at the people and they look at me and they're smiling, then I know that I'm loved. That is the time…
• 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…
• 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…
• When I'm performing for the people, I am me, then. I am that little girl who, when she was five years old, used to sing…
• My mother always wanted me to be glamorous. When I thought about that, it really fired me up, and once I lost all those pounds,…

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