It's a farmers market. You can get whatever - peaches, a sandwich. There might be a little band there. I'd sit in with the band. Yeah, that's what I would do. Sit in with the band at the farmers market. Sing a couple of songs, eat a peach, and hug people.
I would sing the blues if I had the blues.
I'm going to be quite choosy about singing. If I connect to a tune and like what I am offered to sing, I'll do it. I am an actor by profession, not a singer.
It's really hard for me to sing and play bass. Unless you're singing something that's kind of in rhythm with the bass, the melodies, it's just difficult.
There were no artists in Ossining, which was the home of Sing Sing prison. Most of the parents of the guys I knew were guards there.
When I sing, I want people to think only about the tenor and only about the music.
Being able to sing all these years has helped me handle life's tragedies.
I listened to classical music. I listened to jazz. I listened to everything. And I started becoming interested in the sounds of jazz. And I went to a concert of Jazz at the Philharmonic when we lived in Omaha, Nebraska, and I saw Charlie Parker play and Billie Holiday sing and Lester Young play, and that did it. I said, 'That's what I want to do.'
I always tell the story of 'Irreplaceable.' I initially wrote 'Irreplaceable' with myself in mind, with plans of it being my record. I love that record; however, what I realised about that record was that though given the circumstances of that situation - men and women are not that different - when you sing about it, it changes things, you know?
Growing up, I wanted to be a musician. My mother, in typical Filipino-mom fashion, would always make me go up in front of people at parties to sing. Back then, as a kid, I was mortified. In retrospect, I see that doing that as a child helped me get over my fear of being in front of people.
I work 'cause I have to pay the bills. But I also work 'cause I love it. I don't know what I'd do with me if I didn't have this work. It's what I've done all my life. It's my motivation. It's my satisfaction. It's my joy to stand in front of an audience to sing, to come back home and write songs. Man, it's amazing for me.
I have a crush on Steve Tyler. He's funny, he rocks, and has a voice like a god. There is another one who I have discovered can sing. I should try and make an album with him... it's Barack Obama!
Really, music is what I'm interested in, and the lyric part of it came from just having to have something to sing.
I did a lot of musical theater when I was younger, and I really hope to get back there someday. I miss singing a lot. I listen to Broadway show tunes in my car and sing along to them.
I prefer to sing in the shower vs. the car. The shower is just steam, you know, its just you, and nature, and no clothing. You know, there's nothing separating you. It's just you, and the voice - you, and the water.
I really learned to sing in church, I think, really with emotion.
Someone was always trying to put down my individuality and personality, making me sing Mozart arias that were nothing to do with me.
I was with Tina Turner when she first saw Janis Joplin, and she said to Janis, 'Honey, you can't continue to sing like that, or you'll have no voice,' and Janis' response was just to laugh and take a swig on her Southern Comfort.
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.
I'm just going to do things that I like to do, sing songs that I like to sing.
I think maybe because of the kind of music I sing, people want to believe you're a diva. They can't believe after eight years, and eight albums, you're still relatively sane. I feel like they almost want me to throw something at somebody.
Tooting my own horn is of no interest to me... it takes you away from real life. It's a waste, and I don't find a need to sing my own praises.
I worked with Dionne Warwick, did shows with Bette Midler, and then I did the 25th anniversary of the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame with Springsteen at the Garden. It was all important stuff because you want people to know you can work, you can sing, and you can still look good!
I always had a standard of, back when I was doing the country music I always told people I would never record a song that I wouldn't sit down and sing in front of my mom and dad.
I'd love to write a song that someone else sings that can actually sing really well.
On the good days, my mother would haul out the ukulele and we'd sit around the kitchen table - it was a cardboard table with a linoleum top - and sing.
A musical, in its true form, is where emotions reach a height where true spoken word cannot be enough, and you must sing. That's all it is. It's not posh; it's not out of your reach. It's the most visceral way to tell a story.
Jokes rot. They're not like songs. I always envy singers - Sting is always going to sing 'Roxanne'. But people want to hear new jokes. I've written jokes as good as 'Roxanne', I believe. But I can't tell them again.
Singing and acting are actually very similar things. Anyone can sing and anyone can be a film actor. All you have to do is learn.
I'm also taking singing classes as well, not that I ever plan to sing in public in my entire life. I actually have a phobia of singing, so I decided to take some singing lessons to help me get away from the phobia.
I'm an actor, so I think without a character to play, a story to tell, a song to sing... there's some suspicion that there's no 'there' there. Like, if I were to just strip down and present myself, I think I'd sort of just... disappear.
I don't sing now, because I had polio when I was 15, bulbar polio. This was when the epidemic was happening. And I was lucky that it didn't affect my lungs or my legs. It went to my face and kind of paralyzed my vocal chords, and I wasn't able to sing. And they said I was very lucky that I would get over it, which I did.
I love my lecture tours. I get up onstage. I have my stack of books and a glass of water and a microphone. No podium, no distance between me and the audience, and I just talk to people and get all excited and tell a lot of jokes, and sing some songs, and read from my work and remind people how powerful they are and how beautiful they are.
There are so many songs out there in the world that - if I know we have to come up with a new cover, then I'll just sit in my room and sing song after song and figure out which one I can kind of sing the best.
I can't sing that well, but when punk-rock came along, it changed all that.
Just the fact that a thousand people in front of me were ready to hear me sing was one of the best feelings I can think of.
