Top 30 Carly Simon Quotes

You know when you take the paint off an old canvas and you discover that something’s been painted underneath it? That’s what I feel like – that part of the old is coming through the new.

You know, people want to honor me, and on the one hand I just don’t want to be a poster child; but on the other, I want to do something classy and great – something where the residuals will go to the cause.

I had this terrible stammer, so I couldn’t really speak properly until I was 16 or 17.

We need role models who are going to break the mold.

A really strong woman accepts the war she went through and is ennobled by her scars.

No, because I’ve never really changed my style that much.

You’re lucky you had that when you were 20. I sure didn’t. I was overweight, and I had acne.

I always sang standards because the songs I wrote for myself weren’t as easy to sing.

I’ve gone through the village of my songwriting and my artistry, and I’ve gone through lots of different phases, including one where it has been very quiet and abandoned me for a few years.

Then I went through a big Peggy Lee stage, then I became Annie Ross, then Judy Collins.

We are in this period now where we all are trying to be in shape physically and deny ourselves any pleasure.

But when we listened to the radio, it was Bill Haley and the Comets or the Everly Brothers.

The models for me were more the folk-rock singers of the ’60s and ’70s.

I try to get to those peculiar and particular things that you never think of to say.

Well, I tried to get a record deal in 1966 or ’67, and everyone thought I was too eclectic.

I think that I’ve got some pretty bad reviews on albums or songs that later proved themselves.

My father was a classical pianist, and my mother was a singer of just about everything.

Well, I make every song I sing personal. I’ve never chosen a song that wasn’t.

My scar is beautiful. It looks like an arrow.

So I suppose this slightly mature fashion sense happened because of what I had.

My look was even more solidified when I started singing in Greenwich Village with my sister Lucy. We wore matching dresses as the Simon Sisters.

I remember being onstage once when I didn’t have fear: I got so scared I didn’t have fear that it brought on an anxiety attack.

There was a French singer, Francoise Hardy – I used to look at her pictures and try to dress like her.

We went to see all the shows. American musical theater and jazz were very big.

I think that most people really know if it’s a really great album.

I had a mastectomy in 1998, and then chemo.

No, because I was always nervous about being onstage.

I always think it’s interesting to dig a little bit deeper every time you go to someplace that seems like a revelation or a strong connection to an emotional truth.

Sometimes my boyfriend would write the lyrics and I would write the melody, and other times I would start from scratch. Or sometimes I would take a local poem and put that to music.

It didn’t matter as much because I’m a singer, not an actress, but my face is more acceptable in a way now than when I first came on the scene, because I’m part black.