Rufus Wainwright quotes:

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  • You know the question: 'How do you get to Carnegie Hall?' Answer: 'Practise?' Well, in my case, I got there by not practising. I didn't finish my music degree. And when I got into the pop world, I decided not to conform because I figured that the point of being an artist was that you shouldn't be like anyone else.

  • Life is a game and true love is a trophy.

  • There's no life without humour. It can make the wonderful moments of life truly glorious, and it can make tragic moments bearable.

  • Prima Donna' is my kind of love song to opera but it's not the full experience.

  • I'm not born again, I'm not Kabbalah, God forbid, but I did have an experience hitting 30 that I needed to lean on something that assured me that everything is going to be okay. I had to regain a lot of my belief in fairy tales, in happy endings.

  • I definitely consider 'Poses' - the whole album in fact - to be kind of a miracle. Like the last breath of that moment when decadence is healthy, 'Poses' encapsulates that feeling. It's a kind of song and a kind of album that I'll never be able to repeat.

  • Why be in music, why write songs, if you can't use them to explore life or an idealized vision of life? I believe a lot of our lives are spent asleep, and what I've been trying to do is hold on to those moments when a little spark cuts through the fog and nudges you.

  • I could always escape into this demi-monde of homosexuality, which I feel really indebted to. It stopped me being a 'mummy's boy.'

  • I've always gravitated towards opera, and the Royal Opera House is quite possibly the greatest opera house on earth.

  • When I wrote the opera, I made a deal with myself that for at least an hour a day I would work on it, even if it meant just sitting on my piano bench, staring into space and thinking about it. It's about keeping it regular, like your bowel movements - let's get real: it's your bodily artistic movements! It comes from the same place.

  • I may not lead the most dramatic life, but in my brain it's 'War and Peace' everyday.

  • My mother's songs are really turning out to be masterpieces. I have inherited this incredible legacy and am so fortunate to bathe in her sensibilities. It is tinged with tragedy. I'd much rather she was here in person, but there is still a positive force to come out of her death and that is having the gift of music that she gave.

  • I basically have needed to go to the piano and give voice periodically to, you know - I'm always afraid to describe it as a kind of therapeutic process, but nevertheless it was a type of unloading that had to occur due to my personal life with my mother's health or just my professional trials and tribulations.

  • When it came to using elements of your personal life in your work, my mother was the master, or the mistress. There were three or four songs she wrote about my father - songs about failed love.

  • In the present world, this technological, psychotic, politicised, nonsensical world, you have to believe that the good guys are going to win! That evil will be banished somehow!

  • Premiering a new opera is probably one of the hardest things in the world to do, and opening nights of any opera are always pretty stressful.

  • I still believe that love is the most powerful force in the world, even though I am yet to experience it fully.

  • Writing an opera and premiering in England, you could say I was going right into the eye of the storm and I came out successfully. A little tattered and bruised, but so what, I made it.

  • I am regarded as a usurper, as an imposter and dilettante, because I do technically come from the wrong side of the tracks in musical terms.

  • I am always writing; if you want to survive in this business, you need to keep working, keep creating and never stop the output.

  • I bemoan the fact that all my famous friends have places in St. Bart's and I have to go to Montauk.

  • The artist who gave me the most inspiration and direction, especially as a singer - and I absolutely consider myself a singer, 100 percent - is Nina Simone. She's my ultimate pianist-singer-type person.

  • I love being not cool.

  • Looking back, one of the things I love most about my mom was that she never, ever relented. She stuck to her guns right up until the end. She wasn't abusive, but she was never that thrilled that I was gay.

  • Unless I have my aunt or my boyfriend to take care of me, I'm a little pathetic.

  • One of the main destructive forces within our family has been these runaway egos. I think if you look at any show business family, that struggle exists.

  • Places that have experienced great defeat experience a kind of rebirth, which I think America has to do - unless we want to get more decrepit. I don't think we have to destroy the place totally.

  • I think my mother, more than anyone, knew the importance of inspiration. If it was occurring, you had to use it.

  • Once illness strikes, you realize there's not a lot of time for you to do what you really need to do. And there's no time like the present.

  • In the music business, to survive for so long, you have to be able to cut off from your emotions sometimes. And being a father, you're faced with that situation. I know that my father was, with me. I understand why he had to be distant, because to rip yourself away, time after time, is almost more devastating.

  • There is this church that I go to a lot in New York. I'm not religious but I love lighting candles and stuff. I find it useful.

  • When it comes to sitting down and composing, there is no hesitation, no concern, no critics breathing fire down my neck. For me, writing a song is the purest part of all. No one can mess with that.

  • I've developed into quite a swan. I'm one of those people that will probably look better and better as I get older until I drop dead of beauty.

  • Being uncool is being pretty much the coolest you can be.

  • I have an ounce of Lady Gaga's full-bodied ambition.

  • I do not consider myself a guitar player. My father is a guitar player - I'm not.

  • I've been thinking of trying my hand at rap. I've been recording snippets on my BlackBerry.

  • I have this horrible, horrible habit of going on YouTube and checking out comments about what I do.

  • I very much faced my mother's death with hard, arduous and time-consuming labor. The more I would do, the less I would feel.

  • I'm your knight in shining armor. I'm here to save you from Linkin Park.

  • Faith is a bluebird you see from afar, it's for real and as sure as the first evening star. You can't touch it or buy it or wrap it up tight, but it's there all the same, making things turn out right.

  • What I love about my daughter is that she is going to definitely allow me and force me to change my life and slow down and make it more about the real things in the world.

  • Cigarettes and chocolate milk These are just a couple of my cravings Everything it seems I like's a little bit stronger A little bit thicker A little bit harmful for me.

  • I definitely have a Luddite's approach to what's going on. I find that as I get older, I get stupider. For me, the iPhone is harder than reading Faust. I've been hanging out a bit with Lou Reed, and he's the complete opposite. He's into technology and is kind of like a toddler, compared to me, who's like an old 19th-century widow or something.

  • Being with the president's daughter, no matter who the president is, you are connected to the most powerful political force on earth, and that's scary. And when you mix crystal meth and alcohol with that, it's...kind of exciting. A little too exciting.

  • I was in the forest jumping around daffodils while everyone was high on heroin.

  • For me, the iPhone is harder than reading Faust.

  • All these poses of classical torture ruined my mind like a snake in the orchard. I did go from wanting to be someone, now I'm drunk and wearing flip-flops on Fifth Avenue.

  • All humans realize they are loved when witnessing the dawn; early morning is the triumph of good over evil. Absolved by light we decide to go on.

  • Arguably, the relationship between Liza Minnelli and Judy Garland is one of the great mother-daughter sagas of all time. Certainly, for certain people, and a lot of them, Liza is the bigger star. Liza is the more kind of viable legend, shall we say. Then there's the other camp, where Judy is the one.

  • I think the minute you mention death, people run for the hills - unless it's heavy metal. People do not like death.

  • The more hedonistic you were, the better...I very much subscribed to that as a young artist.

  • I am ridiculously high-maintenance.

  • It's about how whenever I fall in love, I have these expectations of the experience being a perfect dream, which, of course, ruins it. I imagine cradling my lover's head in my lap in a cab in the middle of the night, and drinking champagne in an elegant hotel suite. But life's rarely like that, and I usually end up walking home by myself in the rain.

  • I'm definitely a fan of juxtaposition. Using the most beautiful line to say the most horrific thing - I think one of the main things in songwriting is definitely friction between the words and the melody.

  • I like to sing to Verdi, I like singing to Sibelius, and Mahler maybe.

  • My love of maple syrup. I've been known to knock back a can over a couple days: A swig here, a swig there, and next thing you know it's gone. It's a habit I have to stave off. I don't want to lose all my teeth.

  • Mowing your lawn is against nature.

  • I believe a lot of our lives are spent asleep, and what I've been trying to do is hold on to those moments when a little spark cuts through the fog and nudges you.

  • I should write a musical. That is probably one of the final areas that I should pay attention to, because it does kind of involve everything. It's got theatre, it's got young, pretty people... And it's got money!

  • I made the decision to take on board the critical feedback. Reviews are something you can easily ignore as a performer or writer but I chose to not ignore them here and I think that I benefited. I think I'm stronger for it - and I have a tougher skin as a result.

  • I definitely have a Luddite's approach to what's going on. I find that as I get older, I get stupider.

  • I am under no illusion that I will ever be the greatest opera composer in the world, with Wagner and Verdi and Strauss before me. I think my work could fit very nicely into musicals, though.

  • I've developed into quite a swan. I'm one of those people that will probably look better and better as I get older - until I drop dead of beauty.

  • Crazy as it sounds, I'm a believer in destiny and serendipity, and I have had cosmic experiences all my life. Something told me I was meant for greater stuff. And look, I've had a baby! And I've written an opera!

  • I like to think of myself as a combination of Sid Vicious and Virgil Thompson

  • My mother had a lot of parties when I was a child. There'd always be a moment when she would place me on the upright piano and have me sing Somewhere 'Over the Rainbow'.

  • I knew I was gay when I was around 13. There wasn't the internet, there weren't support groups, AIDS was everywhere. I mean, it was really dark.

  • In retrospect, I'm really shocked at how far I put my heart out there on the line with 'Prima Donna'. I seem to have this knack for being able to accomplish that.

  • 'Prima Donna' is my kind of love song to opera but it's not the full experience.

  • I've paid the price; I definitely have a reputation that precedes me, and there is a camp that plots my demise. But then again... it's funner that way.

  • My parents were serious working musicians, but they were not stars - not like pop stars that you have now. They had to make a living and that meant touring, working hard, going on the road - and we were roped in.

  • It seems like the older I get, the more unreal the world becomes.

  • Why be in music, why write songs, if you can't use them to explore life or an idealized vision of life?

  • To me, songs come of their own volition - and with an open-ended philosophy.

  • One day you will come to Montauk and see your dad playing the piano And see your other dad wearing glasses Hope that you will want to stay for a while Don't worry I know you'll have to go

  • I've written songs for Shirley Bassey, Marianne Faithfull, and Linda Thompson. I sort of focus on these wonderful, aging divas. But maybe that's because I think I'm Christina Aguilera.

  • The Germany I was enthused with was more old fashioned and kind of romantic. I just got there, and the next thing you know, I had this huge gilded album. It was kind of an amazing experience because I didn't intend it to be that way.

  • I'm very much a romantic. I'm highly attuned to an older sensibility, which I believe is alive and well. We're not that far ahead of the Romantic Age in society.

  • Some people go to Berlin to get more cutting edge; I went and started wearing lederhosen and going to visit baroque palaces.

  • I have managed to eke out a good and substantial existence. I'm not shoveling gold bricks or anything, but I do very, very well.

  • My cheeks explode when I smile. That's why I have to look so nonplussed.

  • I'm hyper light-sensitive and must sleep in the equivalent of a sealed tomb.

  • After years of hotels, I'm horribly inept at cleaning up after myself.

  • For better or worse, I've always been curious musically. Whether it's opera or Judy Garland or pop, I've deliberately sought those things out. I've never wanted to do the same things over and over. Some think I've accomplished what I set out to do, and others consider me a dilettante.

  • Every video I do is over budget by the time I walk on set. I am massively extravagant in my personal habits.

  • There's prejudice everywhere. I don't think the music industry is as bad as the movie industry. But I have taken a few hits over the years for my sexuality, and for being honest about my life. In the end, it's the music that rules the roost.

  • I've had my ups and downs, and I definitely have a sense - in America, especially - that once you've made your mark and gotten your Rolling Stone piece and your Grammy nomination, that they're on to the next piece of meat, and they don't necessarily like to follow the twists and turns of an artistic career.

  • I'm a big fan of the Pre-Raphaelites. Millais, Edward Burne-Jones, and I realised recently that my music is Pre-Raphaelite in a certain way, in that it reinvents an older era and romanticises it, puts it in this gilded frame.

  • I think we could all be a bit more elitist.

  • I think everybody identified at a pretty young age that I was fairly entranced with myself. And that I had to be tempered.

  • The thing I hate most is false modesty. The artists who are, like, 'Oh, you know, I'm really not that good. Oh, I can't believe I'm here.' I find it vaguely sinister, even.

  • I would love to have a number one hit. The truth is if I don't get one, I'll be fine, but at the same time, the truth is that I'm dying for one, as well.

  • I came out of the closet very young, and I had to cut my teeth pretty fast.

  • I like to try new things.

  • You get to a certain age, and you feel the need to reward yourself just for existing.

  • The moment something happens to one you love, it's twenty times more intense. You experience pain and enlightenment on a much vaster scale.

  • New York is not the centre for American culture and art that it once was because of the forces of conservatism. Giuliani, capitalism - and then there was 9/11. I really believe that if I leave, it will suffer! Maybe that's why I love it here, because I feel wanted.

  • That will to love is very powerful. But it doesn't always win.

  • I'm very fit on tour. I try to eat well, try to sleep. But it's still rock n' roll.

  • A diaper is as inspiring as a drink.

  • And I am left behind Corrupted crushed and blind All for a dream That in truth was never really mine.

  • And you will believe in love And all that it's supposed to be But just until the fish start to smell And you're struck down by a hammer.

  • As an artist, you put so much into what you do and it can all be torn down in a nanosecond.

  • But I don't even think you hear me at all Under your medieval ceiling behind your biblical wall

  • But I want to deepen as an artist, and working with Shakespeare definitely points in that direction.

  • Certainly in terms of my life - anybody's life - you go through death, childbirth and marriage, glory and defeat, and so on.

  • Climate change has always been sort of my main focus. I think also with [what happened in Fukushima, Japan] there's still a lot to think about in terms of what's coming down the pike into the world's oceans, too.

  • Everything I do, I feel is genius. Whether it is or it isn't.

  • Growing up, for years and years I had no idea what the plots of operas were, and that's part of what fascinated me - I could make them up and learn bits and pieces of what was going on over time. There's something about it being always a step away that makes it more fun to chase.

  • Guess the world needs both sun And the moon too Sad with what I have except for you.

  • I am undefinable. I don't fit into any particular category.

  • I believe in freedom Freedom's apparently all I need But who's ever been free in this world? Who has never had to bleed in this world?

  • I definitely try to broaden the scope of music. I don't know if it's pop or classical or what, but I'm religiously challenging myself all the time, for better or for worse.

  • I definitely was always expected and encouraged to be a songwriter from a very young age, ... But really it's because, as a child, I thought I was Judy Garland. And when I started out, I was a little nuts. I thought I was a classic, legendary superstar when only 10 people knew who I was. I feel in some ways that my confidence is misinterpreted as arrogance, which is understandable. But I've also always thought that false modesty is evil.

  • I don't really have a relationship with the guitar; it's like my slutty lover, whereas I'm married to the piano

  • I don't know if it will be my big comeback, but I think it is a statement - that I am a self-sustaining, vibrant, long-term artist, and I'm not going away! And if you don't give me credit, then the musical gods will!

  • I don't want to hold you and feel so helpless I don't want to smell you and lose my senses And smile in slow motion With eyes in love.

  • I find so many songwriters today are missing an element... either the production is amazing but the songs aren't, or it's the other way around.

  • I have a good face for what I do.

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