A painter paints his pictures on canvas. But musicians paint their pictures on silence. We provide the music and you provide the silence.

I saw music as a way to entertain people and take them away from their daily lives and put smiles on their faces as opposed to what I see it being now which is a way for me to actually communicate and a way for me to tap into my subconscious.

Music Rock and Roll music especially is such a generational thing. Each generation must have their own music I had my own in my generation you have yours everyone I know has their own generation.

Rock n' Roll came from the slaves singing gospel in the fields. Their lives were hell and they used music to lift out of it to take them away. That's what rock n' roll should do - take you to a better place.

Those who have virtue always in their mouths and neglect it in practice are like a harp which emits a sound pleasing to others while itself is insensible of the music.

Back then people closed their eyes and listened to music. Today there's a lot of images that go with the music. A lot of music is crap and it's all commercial and the images are all trying to sell the record.

Music makes us want to live. You don't know how many times people have told me that they'd been down and depressed and just wanted to die. But then a special song caught their ear and that helped give them renewed strength. That's the power music has.

A few can touch the magic string and noisy fame is proud to win them: Alas for those that never sing but die with all their music in them!

Poetry fettered fetters the human race. Nations are destroyed or flourish in proportion as their poetry painting and music are destroyed or flourish.

Many people die with their music still in them. Why is this so? Too often it is because they are always getting ready to live. Before they know it time runs out.

Most people live and die with their music still unplayed. They never dare to try.

Composers shouldn't think too much - it interferes with their plagiarism.

Any time you end a relationship and everyone has ended plenty in their life it's always a tough thing and hard to get over.

I think filmmakers want their movies to be seen.

The thing about movies these days is that the commerce end of it is so inflated and financiers are just expecting this enormous return on their investment.

I think movies have much more magic than the theater. Theater can be a magical experience but movies thrust their subjectivity on you in a more profound way.

My sense is I think it's okay for directors to do movies that speak to other work in their career.

I really like the half-hour comedy. I really do. I know people that are in movies all the time and they you know they don't see their families as much. And that takes its toll over time.

At the time I came along Hollywood's idea of teen movies meant there had to be a lot of nudity usually involving boys in pursuit of sex and pretty gross overall. Either that or a horror movie. And the last thing Hollywood wanted in their teen movies was teenagers!

Of course for many years directors have had to go on the road with their movies and promote them and I've done that since the beginning. So that's not new but the forms of it are different such as with the internet.

I love all the old classic Disney movies. 'Pinocchio.' There are obviously tons of them that anybody growing up on that stuff takes with them their whole lives and I'm an admirer of a lot of classic animation and fairy tales. I grew up on a book of Grimm's fairy tales that I kind of wore out again and again. That's all stuff that lingers with you.

The cardinal sin in sports what could really wreck it is not cheating to win which has gone on forever but cheating to lose. That threatens a fundamental aspect of sports' appeal which is their spontaneity. If games are fixed they're no different from movies they're scripted.

The movies that influenced me were movies that told their stories through pictures more than words.

Everybody gets typecast in movies but you have to make wise choices. I'd say around 90 percent of movie casting is about the way you look so you have to fight that. If producers had their way I'd only be in action films but I'm interested in a more varied career than that.