The essential elements of singing are voice, musicianship, and story. It is the rare artist that has all three in abundance.
Interpretation
Successful singing combines vocal ability, musical skill, and storytelling. Few artists excel in all three areas.
In this quote, Linda Ronstadt emphasizes the critical components that contribute to effective singing: a strong voice, enhanced musicianship, and the ability to tell a compelling story through music. By highlighting that it is uncommon for an artist to possess a harmonious balance of these three elements, she suggests that true artistry in singing is a rare and valuable combination that deeply resonates with audiences.
In practice
A music teacher could use this quote to inspire students to develop their vocal skills, musicianship, and storytelling.
I don't record (any type of genre of music) that I didn't hear in my family's living room by the time I was 10. It just is my rule that I don't break because ... I can't do it authentically ... I really think that you're just hard-wiring (synapses) in your brain up until the age of maybe 12 or 10, and there are certain things you can't learn in an authentic way after that.
I miss singing every day. I can't sing anymore. My voice doesn't work. I have Parkinson's disease, and it sometimes takes my words away from me.
I first knew Laurie Lewis by her considerable reputation as a fiddle player and a writer of songs. When an opportunity came along to sing with her I seized it. Getting to know her as a singer and a person has been pure pleasure. Her voice is a rare combination of grit and grace, strength and delicacy. Her stories are always true.
Songwriting wasn't my gift. I think you have to cultivate a gift; you have to practice and develop craft around your gift so that you can execute it in more convenient, efficient ways.
Ninety-nine percent of singing is listening and hearing, and so then 1 percent of it is singing.
Ninety-eight percent of the singing I did was private singing - it was in the shower, at the dishwasher, driving my car, singing with the radio, whatever. I can't do any of that now. I wish I could. I don't miss performing, particularly, but I miss singing.
I don't write because there's an audience. I write because there is literature.
It interests me to imagine characters shifting from one situation and one location to another for whatever the circumstances may be.
If artists and poets are unhappy, it is after all because happiness does not interest them.
Music is the only religion that delivers the goods.
I consider chess an art, and accept all those responsibilities which art places upon its devotees.
I was lucky enough to grow up in a house where we listened to all kinds of music. We listened to Haitian, hip hop, soul, classical jazz, gospel and Cuban music, to name a few. When you have access to that as a child, it just opens up your world.
Subscribe for the occasional hand-picked quote. No noise.