Gordon Lightfoot Quotes & Sayings

Some years later I met Queen Elizabeth II, in our capital Ottawa at a Canada Day celebration. David Foster and I were doing the show and we both met her afterwards. She told me how much she loved the Canadian Railroad Trilogy. She looked at me and said, "oh, that song", and then said again, "that song", and that was all she said. — Gordon Lightfoot

I try to write songs. At our concerts, we take the cream of the crop from my back catalogue and I don't know if I could write something now that would replace any of that. We don't lose any of the standards. We have lots of songs in rotation. — Gordon Lightfoot

My first song was Hula Hoop Song, in 1955. It was a novelty song. I had to find someway to reach out and it was with a novelty song. Now, all of my recording obligations have been taken care of. I made 14 albums for Warner Brothers. Five for United Artist before that. — Gordon Lightfoot

The house you live in will never fall down, if you pity the stranger who stands at your door. — Gordon Lightfoot

I don't think they should regulate the music field. I don't see how they can regulate the arts. — Gordon Lightfoot

I never really had stage nerves but I did have had trouble getting up to the right energy level. For a long time I drank. I drank up until 1982 and then I gave up alcohol. — Gordon Lightfoot

I had lots of friends who were fighting in Vietnam and I am still friends with veterans of the war. — Gordon Lightfoot

To wear the crown of peace, you must wear the crown of thorns. — Gordon Lightfoot

When love is true there is no truer occupation. — Gordon Lightfoot

I went on tours with [Bob] Dylan - the big one was in 1975 and called Roaring Thunder Review. I knew him well because I met him around the time he did his second album, in 1963. He recorded one of my songs called Shadows. In the 1970s, it was suggested that we do a duet, because we had the same manager, Albert Grossman, who also managed Odetta and Peter, Paul and Mary. Dylan and I respected what each other did, but I just decided not to do it. — Gordon Lightfoot

I liked the American folk style of Woody Guthrie. — Gordon Lightfoot

A lot of people influenced me as I was learning but probably Bing Crosby was the most influential, because I would hear his Christmas albums, which my parents played a lot. — Gordon Lightfoot

Getting lost in her loving is your first mistake. — Gordon Lightfoot

There was a TV show called Thank Your Lucky Stars, with the catchphrase "I'll give it five!" The Beatles and Stones were so popular when they were on it. One week The Beatles were number one and then the Stones were right on their heels. — Gordon Lightfoot

I play piano, but not well enough to play professionally. — Gordon Lightfoot

I never got really good at hockey. — Gordon Lightfoot

Sometimes I think it's a shame, when I get feeling better when I'm feeling no pain. — Gordon Lightfoot

I'm not really a bird person or an Audubon guy who studies them, but as I was around them, they interested me. — Gordon Lightfoot

Both the Beatles and The Rolling Stones broke on the music scene the summer I was in England. I can vividly remember hearing She Loves You in August 1963. — Gordon Lightfoot

Whitecaps in profusion all around me, but somehow in your eyes I found the strength to sail upon that raging sea. — Gordon Lightfoot

I love jazz. I still do. Dave Brubeck and Stan Getz are so good. I took a notification course in Jazz Orchestration. It wasn't a grandiose as you'd think but I did have to to go to Los Angeles to do it and get an understanding of the keyboard because the keyboard became my tool and I used it a lot in transposing and composing. All the flats and time values. I spent a year doing that because in those days you had to be able to write your own music and read sheets. — Gordon Lightfoot

What has changed for me is that I now have a huge family [Lightfoot has four children, from his first two marriages] - the result of my living. — Gordon Lightfoot

Sometimes a broken dream will make you sad or make you mean. Sometimes things ain't bad as they seem. — Gordon Lightfoot

It seems so lucky to just to have the right of telling you with all my might, you're beautiful tonight. — Gordon Lightfoot

I would never have ever dreamed that I would get married again and then all of a sudden you meet somebody. That's the thing about life. It can be so unexpected. — Gordon Lightfoot

If I could read your mind, what a tale your thoughts could tell. Just like a paperback novel, the kind that drugstores sell. — Gordon Lightfoot

I don't know where we went wrong, but the feeling's gone and I just can't get it back. — Gordon Lightfoot

I'm a little nuts. I'm a lot nuts. All I know is that in the midst of the madness of this world it's my therapy. The music touches my heartstrings. — Gordon Lightfoot

See the judge upon the bench who tries the case as best he can, see the wise and wicked ones who feed upon life's sacred fire, see the soldier with his gun who must be dead to be admired. — Gordon Lightfoot

I was in Britain that year [1963] and some music publishing people in Denmark Street in London suggested me to the BBC. So I found myself in front of a British television show, which was a nice surprise. — Gordon Lightfoot

It was very interesting time to be in England. Even at that point [John] Lennon and [Paul] McCartney influenced my writing. I thought, "maybe there is a huck or two in here I haven't thought of". — Gordon Lightfoot

Does anyone know where the love of God goes when the waves turn the minutes to hours? — Gordon Lightfoot

The road to love is littered by the bones of other ones, who by the magic of the moment were mysteriously undone. — Gordon Lightfoot

I know that we're being inexorably taken over by the Americans. Without a doubt. I don't mean invaded or anything like that, just taken over. By degrees. — Gordon Lightfoot

She is my flower and she blooms for the one who loves her best. — Gordon Lightfoot

SPEAK OF TROUBLE highlights the abilities of Lowell Sostomi as singer/songwriter and brings together a talented band of musicians with amazing dexterity, loads of energy, and very original arrangements. Im impressed. — Gordon Lightfoot

My parents got my sister and I to go to church and have piano lessons. We were keen and they could see that. — Gordon Lightfoot

If you plan to face tomorrow, do it soon. — Gordon Lightfoot

Rainy day people all know there's no sorrow they can't rise above. — Gordon Lightfoot

I got to sing solo in the junior choir when I was 10 or 11 and won a competition, and my sister's piano playing improved to a certain level. One time my sister and I worked together. The first song we ever sang in High School was Rags to Riches by Tony Bennett. — Gordon Lightfoot

The strength of his will was the tool of his trade. — Gordon Lightfoot

Those who put their faith in fire, in fire their faith shall be repaid. — Gordon Lightfoot

I try to keep it light and positive most of the time, whereas earlier on I didn't always do that. — Gordon Lightfoot

You will go with me everywhere. When I'm dreaming, you still share my lonely nights. — Gordon Lightfoot

I worked in a plant when I was 14 for two years. I always wanted to do the summer jobs. Honest to God, I always had to be doing something. — Gordon Lightfoot

Give me a wave I can ride upon, come and show your strength to me. — Gordon Lightfoot

Words are for explaining the mistakes we might have made, names are for calling when there is nothing left to say. — Gordon Lightfoot

My daughter Meredith Moon from my second wife has a band that does Appalachian music, with five-strong banjo, clawhammer style. I may have to direct her somewhere. Meredith was my middle name. I would have to direct her because I am always directing something. She's in the musician's union and she is only 21. Your kids surprise you. — Gordon Lightfoot

The giant neon spinning discs are a reminder of the huge role that Sam Sniderman and his store played in the cultural life of Toronto and I believe they should be preserved and remounted in the interests of our city's heritage. — Gordon Lightfoot

Will you gather daydreams or will you gather wealth? How can you find your fortune when you cannot find yourself? — Gordon Lightfoot

Silent waters rocking on the morning of our birth,
like an empty cradle waiting to be filled.
And from the heart of God the Spirit moved upon the earth,
like a mother breathing life into her child. — Gordon Lightfoot

Be calm in the face of all common disgraces. — Gordon Lightfoot

If there's a reason for the way that life is I'd like to find it. After all, who's life is it? — Gordon Lightfoot

Let our hearts touch far horizons.
Let our love know no borders,
Draw the Circles wide until,
No one stands alone. — Gordon Lightfoot

Don Quixote was a song for a 1969 Michael Douglas movie called Hail Hero! I wrote the title song for the film and they also used the Don Quixote one I had submitted. — Gordon Lightfoot

I once performed The Wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald to about 15 sea captains. The song was about a ship that broke in half and sank. — Gordon Lightfoot

When I was 16, I used to drive huge loads of laundry in a three ton truck. I would turn round at night to drive back and see the band in a place north of Toronto called Dunn's Pavilion. I would drive that truck all day and they drive back and all the way until one day I wrecked the truck. I fell asleep and wrecked it. I was OK and so was my helper. I called my dad and the first words out of his mouth were, "are you OK?" I was really lucky I had a kind father. — Gordon Lightfoot

Of course I knew The Band's Canadian keyboard player, the late Richard Manuel, but I didn't play that night because I was there as a guest with my record executives. People ask, "why didn't you play?" If I had known I was going to be playing then I would have been prepared for it. — Gordon Lightfoot

All that remains is the faces and the names of the wives and the sons and the daughters. — Gordon Lightfoot

Think about the fool who by his virtue can be found in a most unusual situation playing jester to the clown. — Gordon Lightfoot

Turning back the pages of my sweet shattered dream, I wonder if she'll ever do the same; And the thing that I call living is just being satisfied With knowing I've got no one left to blame. — Gordon Lightfoot

I can remember sitting in a cabin outside of Denver writing that with a can of soup on the stove. — Gordon Lightfoot

Everything is trust, all the rest is dust. — Gordon Lightfoot

I remember when I first rocked in it was a great big dance hall and Tommy Young was blowing trombone and Louis [Armstrong] was singing a tune and it was just Satchmo and you could hear it resounding through the dance hall and people were dancing. It was a highlight. — Gordon Lightfoot

I was happy to be in England, because my mother had always loved the royals, and so do I. — Gordon Lightfoot

I can see her lying back in her faded dress in a room where do what you don't confess. — Gordon Lightfoot

She been looking like a queen in a sailor's dream. — Gordon Lightfoot

'If You Could Read My Mind' was written during the collapse of my marriage. It's a great song. No one has any gripes about it. I wondered what my wife and daughter might think. My daughter is the one who got me to correct 'The feelings that you lacked' to 'The feelings that we lacked'. — Gordon Lightfoot

I was a drummer in the bugle band in cadets. I marched. It's probably quite funny to look back on it. — Gordon Lightfoot

I took the song The First Time Ever I Saw Your Face from a folk singer called Bonnie Dobson. I knew her and she had a record with that track on it. — Gordon Lightfoot

You just get the vibes of your surroundings and it rubs off on you. — Gordon Lightfoot