-
The best training is to play by ear: trial by fire.
John Roger Stephens -
I don't like going to football games. I like watching them on television. When you go to a game, it's hard to focus. There's so much going on, and it's cold. I'd rather sit and watch it and get replays and commentary.
John Roger Stephens
-
My first big break came with Lauryn Hill on a track called Everything is Everything, I played piano on that track way back in 1998.
John Roger Stephens -
I'm trying to be me and embrace all the parts of me that have grown up, listened to more music and soaked up more influences.
John Roger Stephens -
London is a good fashion city. They're a little more daring. There's the element of the aristocracy, which is always interesting.
John Roger Stephens -
I studied African American studies, and I read these slave narratives and the escape narratives of people that were able to escape slavery and always found those stories intriguing and powerful and inspiring.
John Roger Stephens -
We weren't allowed to have secular music in the house growing up. I was home-schooled, and gospel was the only choice we had.
John Roger Stephens -
Dr. King was unpopular while he was alive - he's only popular now because he's dead and not a threat to anyone.
John Roger Stephens
-
I like things that feel like they're timeless and really well made and tailored... things that make me feel confident when I leave the house.
John Roger Stephens -
For me as a songwriter, I love when other people cover my songs.
John Roger Stephens -
I was always the front man for what I was doing from when I was 6.
John Roger Stephens -
I like cool jackets - a nice fall or winter coat. You can get a lot of use out of it, and you'll wear it frequently, so it can really set the tone of your uniform for the season.
John Roger Stephens -
I want to move people.
John Roger Stephens -
As a kid, I wanted to be a musician but also aspired to be Andy Griffith's lawyer character, Ben Matlock.
John Roger Stephens
-
I remember when I first came out as an artist, back in 2004 or 2005, the record label used to take me to all the radio stations and just have me sit in, like, their lunchroom or their conference room, and play for the whole staff. Just to introduce them to me so they would play my records.
John Roger Stephens -
I played classical as a kid.
John Roger Stephens -
My first album, 'Get Lifted,' was a hip-hop soul album that had some of its roots in the church, as far as the sonic choices, in the way that I sing and write songs. I have always had that as part of my background and part of my influence when I am making music.
John Roger Stephens -
There's a certain confidence that comes with being sure about the way the world works.
John Roger Stephens -
We should care about what is going on in the world.
John Roger Stephens -
Artists are, I think in general, compassionate people, and part of what makes us artists is that we're open-minded people, and I think we're almost, by definition, progressive in a lot of ways.
John Roger Stephens
-
Some people start with the lyrics first because they know what they want to talk about and they just write a whole bunch of lyrical ideas, but for me the music tells me what to talk about.
John Roger Stephens -
I want you. All of you. Your flaws. Your mistakes. Your imperfections. I want you, and only you.
John Roger Stephens