Quote

When I'm performing for the people, I am me, then. I am that little girl who, when she was five years old, used to sing at church. Or I'm that 15-year-old young lady who wanted to be grown and wanted to sing and couldn't wait to be smokin' a cigarette, you know?

Etta James

Change background

T
T
T

Change font

TAGS & TOPICS

Etta James
Age: 73 †
Born: 1938
Born: January 25
Died: 2012
Died: January 20
Jazz Musician
Musician
Recording Artist
Singer
Singer-Songwriter
LA
California
Jamesetta Hawkins
Miss Peaches
Years
Five
Lady
People
Church
Grown
Girl
Performing
Used
Sing
Young
Wait
Littles
Couldn
Wanted
Waiting
Smokin
Little
Year
Cigarette

More quotes by Etta James

Image
I'm not starry eyed, and I'm not money crazy.
Etta James
Image
Long as I was riding in a big Cadillac and dressed nice and had plenty of food, that's all I cared about.
Etta James
Image
When I look out at the people and they look at me and they're smiling, then I know that I'm loved. That is the time when I have no worries, no problems.
Etta James
Image
My mother always wanted me to be a jazz singer, but I always wanted to be raunchy.
Etta James
Image
I was a sloppy kid, wanted to be just wild.
Etta James
Image
I don't care who's playing. Even if it's my favorite artist, I'm probably not gonna go and see him.
Etta James
Image
I've gone through so much in my life. I should have been dead a long time ago, but I am still here, and I'm the happiest I've ever been.
Etta James
Image
A lot of people think the blues is depressing but that's not the blues I'm singing. When I'm singing blues, I singing life. People can't stand to listen to the blues, they've got to be phonies.
Etta James
Image
Johnny Guitar... just one of my favorite singers of all time. I met him when we were both on the road with Johnny Otis in the '50s when I was a teenager. We traveled the country in a car together.I would hear him sing every night.
Etta James
Image
I really turned into, you know, the real street kid. I was kind of like a runaway, but I had a mother, you know what I mean, and I had a place to stay.
Etta James
Image
I like to shop, but I don't like to go out to dances.
Etta James
Image
I was originally like a punker, know what I mean, like the punks are today, I'd spit in a minute.
Etta James
Image
Jazz took too much discipline. You have to come in at the right place, which is different than me singing the blues, where I can sing, 'Oh, baby,' if there's a pause in the melody. With jazz, you better leave that space open, or put in something real cool.
Etta James
Image
My mother always told me, even if a song has been done a thousand times, you can still bring something of your own to it. I'd like to think I did that.
Etta James
Image
Bobby Womack is always very real, both with his music and as a person.
Etta James
Image
My mother was a jazz fanatic and she wanted me to play the piano so I could play jazz tunes. I wish I had learned but I was too busy getting into trouble!
Etta James
Image
Even as a little child, I've always had that comedian kind of attitude.
Etta James
Image
I figured I could do It's A Man's, Man's, Man's World because I believe it's the truth.
Etta James
Image
My mother used to play nothing but Billie Holiday.
Etta James
Image
You know, YOUR President, the one with the big ears-he ain't my President - had that woman singing for him at his Inauguration. She's going to get her [expletive] whooped. How dare Beyonce sing MY song that I been singing forever. Now I'm going to sing it for y'all.
Etta James