Top 45 Black Music Quotes

There was certainly, like, a rebellious, like, youthful rage in me. And there was also the fact of no getting away from fact that I am white, and you know, this is predominantly black music, you know.

One motivation for the ‘Soul Train’ awards was the grumbling that all of us in the industry have heard about the way black music tends to be viewed as a secondary phenomenon by the other awards shows.

At the same time, I was listening to black music, and I began to think that the best musicians were receiving the worst treatment. The people who were doing the greatest work were despised as lower class, with no dignity accorded to what they did.

It’s fair to say that white America wouldn’t have elected an African-American president without the integrating effect of black music – from Louis Armstrong to hip-hop – and black drama and fiction, commercial as much as ‘serious.’

Bob Marley performed the ‘One Love Peace’ concert in Jamaica with the two different warring political sides. There’s always been that in black music and culture in general. It’s no surprise because black music is such a reflection of what’s going on in black life. It’s not unusual for hip-hop.

I know a lot of people who enjoy rap music who aren’t black. You can’t just say it’s black music. To segregate films the way Hollywood likes to segregate films, ultimately everyone loses.

I would like to involve myself in some black music. I would like to do some blues and some gospel music. I want to try stuff from other genres and try to widen my musical base.

I guess hip-hop has been closer to the pulse of the streets than any music we’ve had in a long time. It’s sociology as well as music, which is in keeping with the tradition of black music in America.

Even though it’s called Music Of Black Origin, it’s not just music for black people. Music is for everybody. I think it’s good that black music is acknowledged, and it’s open for lots of artists, including white artists who have been inspired by black musical heritage.

In 1965, when great young white artists in the English-speaking world were successfully re-channeling hillbilly and black music – you know Bob Dylan, Ray Davies, Pete Townsend, Keith Richards – they didn’t get any money at first. They were all broke.

That’s because we did not set out to make black music. We set out to make quality music that everyone could enjoy and listen to.

Black music has increased my enjoyment of what I do. It has increased my range, my ability to reach into myself and accept myself.

I had an uncle who adored Al Green. He was white, but he only listened to black music.

Kansas City, I would say, did more for jazz music, black music, than any other influence at all. Almost all their joints that they had there, they used black bands. Most musicians who amounted to anything, they would flock to Kansas City because that’s the place where jobs were plentiful.

Presley is country music, white music. Jazz is black music – it was invented by the blacks in New Orleans. And I’m really a jazz singer. I was impressed with Elvis – he was the handsomest guy I ever met in my life, and a very nice person, too. But the music doesn’t impress me.

You cannot have black music without something soulful in it, whether it’s lyrically, how it’s performed, or how it’s expressed.

If I were to call it black music, that would be untrue. I don’t know what that is, unless it would be some African drums or something.

If you’re doing black music, you should have a core understanding of where that comes from, and the fundamentals – so you’re not some bozo thinking you’re doing something new.

The whole thing about ‘progressive R&B’ blows my mind. Black music has always been progressive.

With the White Stripes we were trying to trick people into not realising we were playing the blues. We did not want to come off like white kids trying to play black music from 100 years ago so a great way to distract them was by dressing in red, white and black.

What I do isn’t black music; it’s just my music.

Black music has become a commercial commodity. Live performances are not so accessible as they were previously. It use to be possible to go to the bar on the corner and hear music. It was available for a fifteen cent beer.

Historically, black music has influenced other cultures and other genres and created other genres.

We had some Stevie Wonder and Luther Vandross, but there’s a lot of hip-hop and other black music that I just never grew up on. My parents didn’t listen to anything other than black gospel.

Rap actually comes out of punk rock, not black music.

I prefer black music in general.

Anybody under the age of forty knows hip-hop, gospel and R&B pretty well, and it’s all a part of what we consider to be ‘black music.’ There is a natural synergy between the three.

I’d like to see more crossover between white and black music. That’s something I’ve been advocating for years.

I want to burn as a beacon of possibility. I don’t want nobody to misconstrue the commercial success I’ve had as anything other than an example of what black music is capable of. And what it’s capable of is being more than just black. I’m not black or white anymore. I’m Cee Lo Green.

A lot of my success comes from black music. It’s something I’m very proud of.

I was the first white British woman to reach No 1 on the R&B chart – the American black music chart.

When people say Jerry Lee Lewis invented rock n’ roll, they forget Little Richard. People talk about Elvis Presley and forget he was singing black music. I don’t blame Elvis. It was the music business figuring it could make more money from this music if it weren’t presented from the original source.

The problem is the following, black music is increasing encumbered by white elements, often pleasant but always superfluous, easily and advantageously replaced with black elements.

I had written a tune called ‘Shake, Rattle and Roll,’ but the white stations refused to play it – they thought it was low-class black music. We thought what we needed was a new name. But a white disc jockey named Alan Freed laid on it, and he thought up the name ‘rock n’ roll.’

The Bee Gees were always heavily influenced by black music. As a songwriter, it’s never been difficult to pick up on the changing styles of music out there, and soul has always been my favourite genre.

I was attracted to black music for the same reason that I loved those old Irish ballads. Both were social statements of sorts, and both were indigenous to their respective cultures: Ireland, where my father had grown up, and towns like St. Louis along the Mississippi River, where I was growing up.

The Righteous Brothers were purely rhythm and blues, black music.

For Black Music Month, I would definitely want to celebrate Isaac Hayes.

Black music is too big and too powerful not to have its own awards show.

I think that American music, for me, it’s a synthesis of a lot of different things. But for me growing up in North Carolina, the stuff that I was listening to, the things that I was hearing, it was all about black music, about soul music.

I want to remind people that black music is amazing. And there are all forms of it that we’ve forgotten, you know? Rock music is black music! Don’t forget that’s what it is.

People ask me why my figures have to be so black. There are a lot of reasons. First, the blackness is a rhetorical device. When we talk about ourselves as a people and as a culture, we talk about black history, black culture, black music. That’s the rhetorical position we occupy.

Black musicians were imitating speech cadences, and Kerouac was imitating the black musicians’ breath cadences on their horns and brought it back to speech. It always was speech rhythms or cadences as far as the ear that Kerouac was developing. All passed through black music.

Between Alan Freed in Cleveland and Bob Horn and Lee Stewart in Philadelphia and George ‘Hound Dog’ Lorenz in Buffalo, they began to find out that white kids liked black music. It was a very significant period of time before I got there.

There is not enough faith in black music at a high level.