Ray Charles Quotes
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But now if I can wrap myself up in that song, and when that song gets to be a part of me, and affects me emotionally, then the emotions that I go through, chances are I’ll be able to communicate to you. Make the people out there become a part of the life of this song that you’re singing about. That’s soul when you can do that.1
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Do it right or don't do it at all. That comes from my mom. If there's something I want to do, I'm one of those people that won't be satisfied until I get it done. If I'm trying to sing something and I can't get it, I'm going to keep at it until I get where I want it.
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Rhythm and blues used to be called race music. … This music was going on for years, but nobody paid any attention to it.
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Hey mama, don't you treat me wrong,Come and love your daddy all night long.All right now, hey hey, all right.See the girl with the diamond ring;She knows how to shake that thing.All right now now now, hey hey, hey hey.Tell your mama, tell your pa,I'm gonna send you back to Arkansas.Oh yes, ma'm, you don't do right, don't do right.
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I started to sing like myself - as opposed to imitating Nat Cole, which I had done for a while - when I started singing like Ray Charles, it had this spiritual and churchy, this religious or gospel sound. It had this holiness and preachy tone to it. It was very controversial. I got a lot of criticism for it.
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I was born with music inside me. That's the only explanation I know of, since none of my relatives could sing or play an instrument. Music was one of my parts. Like my ribs, my kidneys, my liver, my heart. Like my blood. It was a force already within me when I arrived on the scene. It was a necessity for me - like food or water.
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When I was going blind, I didn't turn to God. It didn't seem to me then - and it doesn't seem to me now - that those items were His concern. Early on, I figured I better begin to learn how to count on myself, instead of counting on supernatural forces.
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Before I begin, let me say right here and now that I'm a country boy. And, man, I mean the real backwoods! That's at the start of the start of the thing, and that's at the heart of the thing.
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Affluence separates people. Poverty knits 'em together. You got some sugar and I don't; I borrow some of yours. Next month you might not have any flour; well, I'll give you some of mine. That's how my band made it. We swam through a lot of shit together, we swallowed a lot of pride, but we managed to do what we needed to do.
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The fact of the matter is, you don't give up what's natural. Anything I've fantasized about, I've done.
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I know that men ain't supposed to cry, but I think that's wrong. Crying's always been a way for me to get things out which are buried deep, deep down. When I sing, I often cry. Crying is feeling, and feeling is being human.
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Music has been around a long time, and there's going to be music long after Ray Charles is dead. I just want to make my mark, leave something musically good behind. If it's a big record, that's the frosting on the cake, but music's the main meal.
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You better live every day like your last because one day you're going to be right.
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You gotta know how to get to people's heart
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I got a woman way over town, That's good to me, Oh yeah!
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Yeah yeah, what'd I say, all right Well, tell me what'd I say, yeah Tell me what'd I say right now Tell me what'd I say
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Music is nothing separate from me. It is me. I can't retire from music any more than I can retire from my liver. You'd have to remove the music from me surgically - like you were taking out my appendix.
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Soul is when you take a song and make it a part of you - a part that's so true, so real, people think it must have happened to you. … It's like electricity - we don't really know what it is, do we? But it's a force that can light a room. Soul is like electricity, like a spirit, a drive, a power.
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My music had roots which I'd dug up from my own childhood, musical roots buried in the darkest soil.