Tracy Chapman famous quotes

I'll toss my coins in the fountain, Look for clovers in grassy lawns Search for shooting stars in the night Cross my fingers and dream on.
-- Tracy Chapman

#Dream #Stars #Night

I've seen and met angels wearing the disguise of ordinary people living ordinary lives.
-- Tracy Chapman

#Positive #Angel #People

At this point in my life Id like to live as if only love mattered.
-- Tracy Chapman

We all must live our lives always feeling, always thinking the moment has arrived.
-- Tracy Chapman

#Thinking #Reality #Feelings

After it's finished, sometimes I can trace a path that goes back to the possible source of inspiration.
-- Tracy Chapman

#Inspiration #Path #Sometimes

Some things remain fragments, just the lyrics and melodies or a line or two or a verse.
-- Tracy Chapman

#Two #Lines #Fragments

Songwriting is a very mysterious process. It feels like creating something from nothing. It's something I don't feel like I really control.
-- Tracy Chapman

#Creating #Mysterious #Process

You got a fast car But is it fast enough so we can fly away We gotta make a decision We leave tonight or live and die this way.
-- Tracy Chapman

#Car #Decision #Way

This youthful heart can love you and give you what you need, but I'm too old to go chasing you around wasting my precious energy.
-- Tracy Chapman

#Love #Heart #Giving

You have to pay attention to the moment and make it the best it can be for you. I've been trying to do that. It's really made a major difference for me. I'm a happier person.
-- Tracy Chapman

#Differences #Trying #Attention

It's time to start all over/make a new beginning.
-- Tracy Chapman

#New Beginnings

I'm still thinking and hoping there's an opportunity for people to have better lives and that significant change can occur.
-- Tracy Chapman

#Opportunity #Thinking #People

I don't want someone to squeeze me, that might take away my life. Just want someone to hold me, and we'll rock through the night.
-- Tracy Chapman

#Night #Rocks #Want

I end up writing about all kinds of things. I never make an attempt to write about anything in particular. I don't have a little list of topics to write about.
-- Tracy Chapman

#Writing #Littles #Topics

I'm not sure about anything as far as religion and spirituality go.
-- Tracy Chapman

#Spirituality #Not Sure

I see some recurring themes: things that feel threaded together, some symbolic references, and songs about some of the big questions, like death. There are a lot of references to weather, too!
-- Tracy Chapman

#Song #Weather #Together

As a child I spent a lot of time at the library.
-- Tracy Chapman

#Children #Library

We have more media than ever and more technology in our lives. It's supposed to help us communicate, but it has the opposite effect of isolating us.
-- Tracy Chapman

#Technology #Media #Talking

I found myself in the middle of a race riot when I was about 14 years old, and I found someone pointing a gun at me and telling me to run or they'd shoot me.
-- Tracy Chapman

#Running #Gun #Years

I don't try to project any image at all, other than the person that I am.
-- Tracy Chapman

#Trying #Projects #Persons

Words don't come easily, like forgive me.
-- Tracy Chapman

#Reality #Forgive Me #Forgiving

I learn all these things about the record talking about it after it's finished.
-- Tracy Chapman

#Talking #Records

Everyone is looking for connections between the songs. I don't usually approach a record as a concept. There's no overriding theme I'm trying to represent. It's all about the individual songs.
-- Tracy Chapman

#Song #Trying #Records

When you feel like you've had a good show, you go backstage and you talk to yourself about it, and if you have a bad show you talk to yourself about it.
-- Tracy Chapman

#Like You #Shows #Feels

Growing up in Cleveland, I learned about singing from my mother, who had once sung professionally and who admired Mahalia Jackson and Aretha Franklin.
-- Tracy Chapman

#Mother #Growing Up #Singing

As a child I always had a sense of social conditions and political situations. I think it had to do with the fact that my mother was always discussing things with my sister and me - also because I read a lot.
-- Tracy Chapman

#Mother #Children #Thinking

People's real hopes and dreams can be distorted and misdirected and packaged until you're not sure what you really want or what you even really need.
-- Tracy Chapman

#Dream #Real #People

Have faith in humankind a respect for what is earthly and an unfaltering belief in peace and understanding
-- Tracy Chapman

#Respect #Understanding #Have Faith

So don't be tempted by the shiny apple Don't you eat of a bitter fruit Hunger only for a taste of justice Hunger only for a world of truth 'Cause all that you have is your soul.
-- Tracy Chapman

#Love #Apples #Justice

Love is hate War is Peace No is Yes And we're all free.
-- Tracy Chapman

#Hate #War #Love Is

Now love's the only thing that's free /We must take it where it's found /Pretty soon it may be costly
-- Tracy Chapman

#May #Found

Why do babies starve /When there's enough food to feed the world /Why when there's so many of us /Are there people still alone
-- Tracy Chapman

#Baby #People #World

I often write either really early in the morning, or really late at night.
-- Tracy Chapman

#Morning #Writing #Night

I dressed up as a veterinarian for a Halloween costume party. I had the lab coat. I got a couple of stuffed animals for patients and put bandages on them.
-- Tracy Chapman

#Couple #Halloween #Party

I picked up the guitar at 11, but even before then, I was writing songs on the organ.
-- Tracy Chapman

#Song #Writing #Guitar

I think it's important, if you are an artist, to use your music to stand up for what you believe in.
-- Tracy Chapman

#Believe #Thinking #Artist

A lot of kids spent more time out of school than in, but I always loved school and thought it was my way out of Cleveland, and out of poverty.
-- Tracy Chapman

#School #Kids #Way

I love living in California and being able to go to the beach or go to the woods.
-- Tracy Chapman

#Beach #California #Able

With other people, you're always swapping music. Somebody is always listening to something you've never heard. It's a great way to hear all sorts of new things.
-- Tracy Chapman

#People #Listening #Swapping

I think many people would say that writers like Stephen King have hypergraphia.
-- Tracy Chapman

#Kings #Thinking #People

Consume more than you need This is the dream Make you pauper Or make you queen I won't die lonely I'll have it all prearranged A grave that's deep and wide enough For me and all my mountains o'things
-- Tracy Chapman

#Dream #Lonely #Queens

Who took away the part so essential to the whole Left you a hollow body Skin and bone.
-- Tracy Chapman

#Numbness #Skins #Body

Renounce all those material things that you gained by exploiting other human beings.
-- Tracy Chapman

#Renounce #Misinterpretation #Materials

Men are able to sustain a career into their 50s and 60s and still present themselves as sex symbols. With women, on the other hand, people say, 'Why doesn't she retire?'
-- Tracy Chapman

#Sex #Men #Hands

I got a plan to get out of here, I've been working at a convenient store.
-- Tracy Chapman

#Stores #Plans #Explanation

My old man's got a problem, he lives with the bottle.
-- Tracy Chapman

#Family #Men #Bottles

I may be revered or defamed and decried; But I tried to live my life right.
-- Tracy Chapman

#May #Living My Life

Love's a recurring theme through my work.
-- Tracy Chapman

#Theme #Recurring Themes

My older sister encouraged me from early on and bought me one of the first guitars I had. She listened to all of the crappy songs that I wrote when I was 8 years old and encouraged me to keep doing it.
-- Tracy Chapman

#Song #Years #Guitar

The songs are not necessarily autobiographical. A lot of songs are a combination of influences. It might be some part of my life, or something I've felt, or something somebody's told me. It all comes together.
-- Tracy Chapman

#Song #Together #Might

I never assumed I would have that commercial success, so it was a total surprise. And honestly, I never assumed that it would ever happen again.
-- Tracy Chapman

#Surprise #Never Assume #Honestly

I meet people in my daily life, people who seem to experience some change and some growth on a personal level, and that gives me hope.
-- Tracy Chapman

#Giving #People #Growth

We are the spirit, the collective conscience. We create the pain, and suffering, and beauty in this world.
-- Tracy Chapman

#Pain #Philosophy #Suffering