Western Music Quotes

• Western music is arguably America's greatest contribution to the 20th century, cultural or otherwise.

  Steve Erickson

  America, Century, Music Is

  Source: therumpus.net

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• I'm very interested in music and where these sounds of Western music come from.

  Ben Katchor

  Sound, Western

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• I find a difference between what gets called world music - a fusion of western music and music from different cultures in more of a modernized version - and Explorer Series stuff, which is completely undiluted indigenous folk music. That's a lot more powerful than a lot of the super-processed stuff that comes out now.

  Glenn Kotche

  Powerful, Differences, Fusion

  Source: pitchfork.com

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• I'm not crazy about country-western music. But the lyrics are good. "I'd rather have a bottle in front of me than a frontal lobotomy" is pretty clever.

  Alice Cooper

  Country, Clever, Crazy

  "Alice Cooper: What I've Learned" by Cal Fussman, www.esquire.com. January 2, 2009.

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• Essentially my contribution was to introduce repetition into Western music as the main ingredient without any melody over it, without anything just repeated patterns, musical patterns.

  Terry Riley

  Gdp, Musical, Patterns

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• I've been informed by both sides, jazz, western music, Asian music, African music, all sides, because I've been interested in the sound of the universe, and that sound is without limit.

  Joseph Jarman

  Sound, Asian, African Music

  Interview with Jason Gross, www.furious.com. October 1999.

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• Skiffle was blues featuring a washboard and acoustic instruments. It encompassed blues, with elements of folk, jazz, and, at times, American country-and-western music.

  Van Morrison

  Country, Elements, Acoustics

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• The piano is a bit of a monster because it is this center of Western music and so much has been done with it and it is a fixed pitch instrument. It is a bit like trying to paint because there is the weight of all that has been done before.

  Michael Snow

  Piano, Trying, Monsters

  Source: offscreen.com

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• With a few exceptions like Kraftwerk, most great 20th century Western music is in some way American-based. And the great paradox of America, the paradox that distills America, is that this greatest of American contributions to humanity, this American contribution that probably has influenced more people around the world for the good, that probably has brought more people around the world unqualified joy, was born of America's greatest evil, slavery. Or one of the two great evils anyway, counting the European extinction of those who were on the continent first.

  Steve Erickson

  Two, America, People

  Source: therumpus.net

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• [Europe has] this tradition of self revelation in popular music. We have it here - it's called Country Western Music... I think that's where the deeper and more complex subjects are treated.

  Leonard Cohen

  Country, Thinking, Self

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• Within the context of Western music, jazz has always contained certain radical or revolutionary aspects. These are: improvisation, collective composition and individuality or the personal sound (based on amazing variations in sonority, timbre and pitch).

  Michael Snow

  Individuality, Sound, Variation

  Michael Snow, Louise Dompierre (2010). “The Collected Writings of Michael Snow”, p.189, Wilfrid Laurier Univ. Press

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• People never heard bells in Western music sounding really cataclysmic. You hear that more in Russian music or in Asian, Indonesian traditions.

  Charlemagne Palestine

  People, Asian, Bells

  Source: thequietus.com

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• Sometimes I lie awake at night and think about that little red-haired girl... I don't ever want to forget her face, but if I don't forget her face, I'll go crazy... How can I remember the face I can't forget? Suddenly I'm writing country western music!

  Charles M. Schulz

  Girl, Country, Crazy

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• I'm a big fan of gospel music, and you cannot be a fan of rock and roll, you cannot be a fan of country western music, and you can't really be a fan of jazz without listening to a lot of music that's religious.

  Penn Jillette

  Country, Religious, Rocks

  "Magician Penn Jillette Says 'God, No!' To Religion". "Talk of the Nation" with Neal Conan, www.npr.org. August 16, 2011.

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• I'm not crazy about country-western music. But the lyrics are good.

  Alice Cooper

  Country, Crazy, Lobotomy

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