Alicia Keys

What if… everything you are going through is preparing you for what you asked for?

I want to make sure all the issues about race are addressed

I love learning about different religions, and discovering the different ways to worship, and to love the greatness and the higher being that surrounds us all. I definitely believe in a bigger presence, and I really respect all religions; at their core they all teach the same message – community and kindness and looking out for each other.

Sometimes, I want some damn makeup, and I’m going to wear it! Guess what — if I want to wear red lipstick and put eyelashes on, I can do whatever I f**king want. I am the creator of my own destiny,

In the 1990s, with Mariah Carey, Whitney Houston, those really big female artists were very glamorous, it was all about the glamour at that time. And so there was a big switch, the desire to be more who you were, not so beholden to this whole standard of beauty. It was a liberation. You see Mary J Blige – she did the same, wearing the combat boots.

The trees are about to show us how lovely it is to let things go.

You know at an early age if you have a talent for music.

I loved Billie Holiday more than any other person other than myself on the stage.

Jazz musician is a combination entertainer, poet, singer, educator, student, artist, seducer and all-round good fellow.

Anybody can write music of a sort. But touching the public heart is quite another thing.

I often wonder whether Negroes like myself who are pretty well known help out at all in breaking down barriers.

Yeah, it’s more like playing what you think is appropriate for the moment, not forcing any particular style.

Well if I could play like Wynton, I wouldn’t play like Wynton.

Using drugs didn’t help me play, all it did was hang me up for 15 years.

Sounds of daily life are musical. I try to absorb the intricacies of sounds as if I were listening to music.

If you find a note tonight that sounds good, play the same damn note every night!

Why Jazz? This is just the way I see music.

One thing I like about jazz is that it emphasized doing things differently from what other people were doing.

I don’t believe music can be free unless it has something to be free from.

I thought I had swell ideas and wonderful musicians but no one else did.

Every symphony, for example, is a sonata for orchestra; every string quartet is a sonata for four strings; every concerto a sonata for a solo instrument and orchestra.