I hate to say this, but I always listen to the music and the instrumentation first, and then grab on to the lyrics later.
Interpretation
This quote expresses the priority of appreciating music and instrumentation before focusing on lyrics.
Elton John's quote highlights the importance he places on the musical elements of a song over its lyrics. It suggests that the emotional and aesthetic experience of music is often more immediate and powerful, with lyrics serving as a secondary aspect that can be appreciated later. This perspective encourages listeners to value the artistry in composition and sound as a foundational experience in music.
In practice
In a music appreciation class, when discussing the elements of a song.
I don't want to be married. I'm very happy with a civil partnership. If gay people want to get married, or get together, they should have a civil partnership. The word 'marriage,' I think, puts a lot of people off. You get the same equal rights that we do when we have a civil partnership. Heterosexual people get married. We can have civil partnerships.
I just wish more of my fellow queers would come out sometimes. It's nice out here, you know?
At heart I've always been a music fan. That part of me has never changed since I was a little kid, sitting in a room watching a record go round, looking at the colour of the labels.
So excuse me forgetting, but these things I do_x000D_ _x000D_ You see I've forgotten, if they're green or they're blue_x000D_ _x000D_ Anyway, the thing is, what I really mean_x000D_ _x000D_ Yours are the sweetest eyes, I've ever seen.
Don't be afraid to let her into your heart and when your down, don't try to carry the whole world on your shoulders.
When Little Richard used to stand up and play it was just fabulous, and Liberace had the candlesticks and the rings and the gift of the gab. The piano's is the most ungainly rock' n' roll instrument of all time but those two people transcended it, as did Jerry Lee Lewis.
Writing historical novels can be dangerous. We need to be as accurate and as fair about the historical record as we can be, at the same time as creating our fictional characters and, hopefully, telling a good story. The challenge is weaving the fiction into the history.
It is not hard to compose, but what is fabulously hard is to leave the superfluous notes under the table.
The essence of dramatic form is to let an idea come over people without it being plainly stated. When you say something directly, it's simply not as potent as it is when you allow people to discover it for themselves.
Art is not like other culture because its success is not made by its audience. The public fill concert halls and cinemas every day, we read novels by the millions, and buy records by the billions. 'We the people' affect the making and quality of most of our culture, but not our art.
Get yourself in that intense state of being next to madness. Keep yourself in, not necessarily a frenzied state, but in a state of great intensity. The kind of state you would be in before going to bed with your partner. That heightened state when you're in a carnal embrace: time stops and nothing else matters. You should always write with an erection. Even if you're a woman.
I don't need to manufacture trauma in my life to be creative. I have a big enough reservoir of sadness or emotional trauma to last me.
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