I'm 47 years old. I couldn't compete with Beyonce. I'm not competing with anyone. I've already established myself as an artist. I've been in this business for 30 years. There's no reason for me to compete with anyone.

I don't drink, I don't smoke and I don't party.

Millions have been taken from me. If you are not on top of it and you make a lot of money, and you trust business managers, then, yes, money will be taken from you.

Most women don't like good men. They say they want a good buy, but most women always wind up with the bad boy.

I enjoy being single, but I loved being married.

I'm about to sing the song for the future.

This is something I love to do. I've never had any other job. I love singing and entertaining.

I don't know what it takes to make marriage work, but I'm going to keep trying until I get it right. I haven't given up on love or marriage.

Therapy can help you grow. Fears will just disappear.

I believe entertainers should know what's going on and do their own banking.

It's the best thing ever - I love being a mom. This is my only child. My career was a priority earlier in my life, but now my son is definitely the priority.

Everything that's old is new, and everything that's new is old.

I'm 47 years old. I couldn't compete with Beyonce. I'm not competing with anyone. I've already established myself as an artist. I've been in this business for 30 years. There's no reason for me to compete with anyone.

Being a mom has made me a better person. It's made me more compassionate. It's just awesome. I think I was put here to be a mom.

Even before coming into the industry, I was a big fan of Motown, the Jackson 5, Gladys Knight, the Temptations, Diana Ross and The Supremes.

I don't think that everything on Broadway relates to us, and I think that's why we as black people don't always go to Broadway shows, but shows like 'What's on the Hearts of Men' has a lot of issues that can relate to black families, and that's why I enjoy it.

I have mad love for the way we were taught and trained back in the day. I mean, those of us - like Chaka Khan, Patti LaBelle, Gladys Knight - we didn't give into this new wave of celebrity.

I like Jay-Z. I love Luda. I love Ledisi. I like Beyonce, of course. I think she's just brilliant. She's a triple threat. But my favorite - my all-time rapper is Tupac. See, I could have been Tupac's girlfriend.

I listen to Jay-Z, Nelly, Nas, Ludacris and all the young kids out there. I listen to them, and I have mad respect for them.

I love theater. I started in theater when I was nine years old.

I realize that R&B is what I do best, and I'm comfortable with that.

I thought that I was going to be Mrs. Michael Jackson, but I was ready at 20 and 21 to get married, and he was not even close to getting married or having a girlfriend at that time, but yes, we dated. We dated for a while.

I would love to do a collaboration with Lil' Wayne. I would have loved to sing on his song, 'How To Love.' I wanted to do the remix to that song really bad.

I'd like to have mass appeal, but not at the expense of what I am and what I do best.

Onstage, you can be anything you want to be. In concert, I might project a different side of myself, but I wouldn't do anything I'd be embarrassed of.

Time clocks rob the world of wild possibility. Thats what theyre for.

Environmentalists have long been fond of saying that the sun is the only safe nuclear reactor situated as it is some ninety three million miles away.

Being a cover artist is not like being a real artist. That's just copying what someone else did.

The artist need not know very much; best of all let him work instinctively and paint as naturally as he breathes or walks.

What an artist learns matters little. What he himself discovers has a real worth for him, and gives him the necessary incitement to work.

Beauty, like truth, is relative to the time when one lives and to the individual who can grasp it. The expression of beauty is in direct ratio to the power of conception the artist has acquired.

I'm inspired by nature. Other artist's work is important for developing my perception.

There is only one position for an artist anywhere; and that is upright.

The difference between a bad artist and a good one is: the bad artist seems to copy a great deal; the good one really does.

To say that an artist sells out means that an artist is making a conscious choice to compromise his music, to to weaken his music for the sake of commercial gain.

What do you say when someone has truly inspired you? How do you express to an artist how deeply their work has affected you?

An original artist is unable to copy. So he has only to copy in order to be original.

When I say artist I mean the man who is building things - creating molding the earth - whether it be the plains of the west - or the iron ore of Penn. It's all a big game of construction - some with a brush - some with a shovel - some choose a pen.

You have to find what makes you stable in the storm. Then, no matter what's happening round you, no matter what the hype or the publicity, you can still manage to make leaps in your work as an artist.

The key to the mystery of a great artist is that for reasons unknown, he will give away his energies and his life just to make sure that one note follows another... and leaves us with the feeling that something is right in the world.

I've always felt that if one was going to take seriously this vocation as an artist, you have to get beyond that decorative facade.

Art is a private thing, the artist makes it for himself; a comprehensible work is the product of a journalist. We need works that are strong, straight, precise, and forever beyond understanding.

The most colorful section of a bookstore is the display of SF books, with art by people like Wayne Barlow, who is a terrific artist.

Arguably, no artist grows up: If he sheds the perceptions of childhood, he ceases being an artist.

Let not a man do what his sense of right bids him not to do, nor desire what it forbids him to desire. This is sufficient. The skillful artist will not alter his measures for the sake of a stupid workman.

I so much appreciate it when anybody tries to make something and tries to be an artist - I'm happy to see the work.

The artist is seen like a producer of commodities, like a factory that turns our refrigerators.

I've also been willing to share any help that I could give to any other artist.

An artist, under pain of oblivion, must have confidence in himself, and listen only to his real master: Nature.