Ray Charles

I do Jazz, Blues, Country and so forth. I do them all like a good utility man.

There are many spokes on the wheel of life. First, we’re here to explore new possibilities.

I never wanted to be famous. I only wanted to be great.

Music’s 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.

The fact of the matter is, you don’t give up what’s natural. Anything I’ve fantasized about, I’ve done.

I was born with music inside me. 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.

Work out your own salvation. Do not depend on others.

For those who believe in God, most of the big questions are answered. But for those of us who can’t readily accept the God formula, the big answers don’t remain stone-written. We adjust to new conditions and discoveries. We are pliable. Love need not be a command or faith a dictum. I am my own God. We are here to unlearn the teachings of the church, state, and our educational system. We are here to drink beer. We are here to kill war. We are here to laugh at the odds and live our lives so well that Death will tremble to take us.

You will not be punished for your anger, you will be punished by your anger.

Our whole spiritual transformation brings us to the point where we realize in our own being, we are enough.

It ain’t those parts of the Bible that I can’t understand that bother me, it is the parts that I do understand.

A man who is good enough to go to heaven is not good enough to be a clergyman.

Remembering a wrong is like carrying a burden on the mind.

The greatest impurity is ignorance. Free yourself from it. Be pure.

God has no religion.

I believe God is managing affairs and that He doesn’t need any advice from me. With God in charge, I believe everything will work out for the best in the end. So what is there to worry about.

Jesus was all right, but his disciples were thick and ordinary. It’s them twisting it that ruins it for me.

A miracle is an event which creates faith. That is the purpose and nature of miracles. Frauds deceive. An event which creates faith does not deceive: therefore it is not a fraud, but a miracle.

[On religion:] Wasn’t it invented by man for a kind of solace? It’s as though he had said, ‘I’ll make me a nice comfortable garment to shut out the heat and the cold,’ and then it ends by becoming a strait-jacket.

Do not worship me, I am not God. I’m only a man. I worship Jesus Christ.

I lost my faith in God when I lost my daughter to Cancer, the beast. I begged, I cried, I offered my life for hers, and day by day, I watched that beautiful little Angel slip off. So, excuse me for not taking my seat next to you on Sunday in Church, I feel too cheated to worship.