But, in fairness to them, too, the popular song per se is really a pretty shallow medium to perform in.

Because obviously the whole purpose of putting records out is purely and simply to make money.

I would be a liar if I said it wouldn't be lovely and soothing - that's the word - to have a hit single or a hit album.

I want to sing for the broadest possible audience.

Talking money is crass; so I'm not going to tell you what I made last year.

See, I never wrote arrangements for the band for Judy Garland; I did strictly special material, special lyrics, put together all of her medleys.

As regards my feelings about drummers - there's Buddy Rich, and then there's everybody else.

As a singer, the biggest joy I have are the arrangements.

I didn't really have an act per se - a theatrical performance, as opposed to just: here I am, folks, and you're all supposed to be dead quiet while I sing eight or nine songs, then get off the stage.

Right now, my career is in three directions: as a performer, as an arranger, as an author - and I don't give any one of them true precedent, or true top marks, as opposed to the other two.

As Buddy Rich, for instance, broke into the business at the age of three, I think it was, on drums, so indeed did I break into the business at the age of four as a singer.

How many radio shows I did is lost to memory now; it's in the hundreds - maybe even close to being in the thousands - for the span of years from the time I was eight till I was about fifteen.

My initial career, really, as a baby, was as a singer.

Because Chicago was to radio what Hollywood was to films and Broadway was to the theatre: it was the hub of radio.

I got into radio when I was eight, and I was one of the busiest child dramatic actors in America.

Buddy Rich is one of a kind; he's a genius, and that's all there is to it.

I was a singer professionally when I was four years old, and I did not really begin to play any instrument - the first one, of course, was drums - till I was about nine years old.

I hadn't been a recording artist all that long when albums came on the scene, and I was one of the first singers to point the way to how varied an album's contents could be.

Whenever I did a good performance, my Dad and my uncles, who were rabid movie fans, took me to the movies. There began my underlying love affair with film.

But, in fairness to them, too, the popular song per se is really a pretty shallow medium to perform in.

There isn't a dearth of it, but I will confess that it's harder for me to find songs on which I'm willing to invest anything from ten to fifteen hours writing an arrangement than it was in times past.

It may sound a bit like an army barracks, but the truth of the matter is: there must be some time laid aside for arranging, time for working on either a book or an article - I've written two articles in the last four months for the New York Times book review section.

So I'm sorry, I'm going to continue to talk to the people, because I do believe that if they get to know you and what you are as a human being, they can more appreciate what you are as a performer.

To me, nostalgia is nothing more than a mindless plundering of the past for the common place.

I was surprised that the TV series was popular itself, but after that it went on to become more popular over the years and thus it seemed eventually that they would turn it into a movie.

Well, I think that those of us in public life that are trying to do a good job, and that are faced with this popular new game that the media has of being critical of everything that anybody in public office does probably are thin-skinned.

Yeah; I'm a much better blues player than anybody knows, but being in the kind of group I'm in, we were always trying to make popular records.

The reason it has relevance is because I, as a popular Arab personality - the Arab people like me and respect me - thought it was time for me to make an ever so tiny statement about what I thought about this whole thing.

A growing awareness of the depth of popular attachment to the family has led some liberals to concede that family is not just a buzzword for reaction.

When you put a tiny and despised minority up for a popular vote, the minority usually loses.

I've been amazed that it's so popular with people. But it's been fantastic. People are very excited when I walk into a place and they recognize me from the series.

The Smithsonian Institute is one of the most popular agencies of government in the United States.

Popular opinions, on subjects not palpable to sense, are often true, but seldom or never the whole truth.

My esoteric doctrine, is that if you entertain any doubt, it is safest to take the unpopular side in the first instance. Transit from the unpopular, is easy... but from the popular to the unpopular is so steep and rugged that it is impossible to maintain it.

In a strange kind of way I know were really popular and probably the biggest band in the country at the moment, but at the same time there is this real cult thing going on.

The Pentagon still has not given a name to the Iraqi war. Somehow 'Operation Re-elect Bush' doesn't seem to be popular.

When I go to Japan and do shows I play for 1,000 to 1,500 people. I like a lot about Japan. Their popular culture and mass commercialization appeals to me.

The way I see it, all the popular singers are strippers.

An able, disinterested, public-spirited press, with trained intelligence to know the right and courage to do it, can preserve that public virtue without which popular government is a sham and a mockery.

Video games are so popular these days, getting the opportunity to star in one is something special. More people should do it.

And we just went with Julie because that name hadn't been used in any other popular songs at the time.

I'd like to be remembered as a premier singer of songs, not just a popular act of a given period.

None of the modes by which a magistrate is appointed, popular election, the accident of the lot, or the accident of birth, affords, as far as we can perceive, much security for his being wiser than any of his neighbours.

The fellow that can only see a week ahead is always the popular fellow, for he is looking with the crowd. But the one that can see years ahead, he has a telescope but he can't make anybody believe that he has it.

There's a great difference between being popular and being an artist.

This whole fuss did not only damage Fischer's image, but that of the USA as well. The way the Americans treated one of their most popular citizens did not make a positive impression worldwide.

I was delighted to become a popular-culture reference point. I'm still delighted about it actually, and I still find it to be weird.

Religion is not a popular error; it is a great instinctive truth, sensed by the people, expressed by the people.

Only under conditions of revolutionary crises do you have the highest level of self-organization; this is the Soviet type of organization, which is to say, workers' councils, people's councils, call them what you want, popular committees.