Tony Bennett Quotes & Sayings

It sounds so simple, but if you just be yourself, you're different than anyone else. — Tony Bennett

Every day feels like just starting out because I still have so much more to learn. — Tony Bennett

I still insist that American performers are the best performers in the world. — Tony Bennett

I've never worked a day in my life. — Tony Bennett

I'm still learning about music. The best way to learn is to listen to the audience. When you listen to the audience, they will tell you what they like. I wish these big corporations, instead of telling the audience what they should have, would listen. — Tony Bennett

I lived for 15 years in Los Angeles, and I still can't believe that the handsomest man in the world, Cary Grant, and the greatest performer in the world, Fred Astaire, and Johnny Carson, one after another - they were all in my home at different times. I celebrated my 50th birthday with them. Unforgettable. — Tony Bennett

Singing intimately is almost like thinking into a microphone, so it helps to have the song buried inside you. — Tony Bennett

I can't ask for more out of life, and the more I learn, the less I know. — Tony Bennett

The biggest message I've given our team, and I think it's really important, is first of all, no one can take away what happened last year. It's obviously a fun year, a terrific year. But I think a big mistake would be to try to compare themselves or ourselves to last year's team. I think the key really is, and I told them this: for you as a group, you're a different team. — Tony Bennett

I'd like to have every gentleman and lady in this room commit themselves to get our government to legalize drugs, so they have to get it through a doctor, not just some gangsters who sell it under the table. Let's legalize drugs like they did in Amsterdam. No one's hiding or sneaking around corners to get it. They go to a doctor to get it. — Tony Bennett

Life teaches you how to live it - if you live long enough. — Tony Bennett

Regardless of religion or race or ethnic background we are all human and we are all on this planet together. So what better reason do you need to not tolerate any form of violence against another human being? — Tony Bennett

My goal as a creative person is to express truth and beauty in whatever I do — Tony Bennett

If you are creative, you get busier as you get older. — Tony Bennett

The United States created the best popular songs that were ever written, and from the 1920s to the 1940s, it was a renaissance period. It stopped in 1950. — Tony Bennett

I have to say I owe my career to the master composers of the Great American Songbook who have written such high-quality songs - the best popular music ever composed. — Tony Bennett

Luckily for his audiences, Bennett doesn't tire of singing I Left My Heart ... that song made me a world citizen. And when I do it, it always feels like the first time. — Tony Bennett

You can't teach it [jazz singing]. There's nobody who can teach you how to sing jazz. Either you know how to sing jazz, or you don't. — Tony Bennett

The young people look great on television. They're youthful and have a lot of zip and energy, but when you see them live, they can only do about 20 minutes because they haven't got the training to hold an audience for an hour and a half or so. — Tony Bennett

I knew very early that somehow I would sing and draw and paint my whole life. — Tony Bennett

I have grown to appreciate the power of believing in myself and of always having faith in myself. I rarely look back; instead, I always look forward. There is so much of life that we miss when we wallow in regret. — Tony Bennett

The singers who are the most honest are the ones who become immortalized. — Tony Bennett

If music sounds dated, it means it wasn't very good in the first place. — Tony Bennett

I want to try to prove that at 100, I could sing as well as I was singing when I was 45 or 43. — Tony Bennett

I still have a lot to learn. I'm concentrating on learning a lot more about music. — Tony Bennett

Every show is different. The public has always been nice to me. I'm fortunate that way. — Tony Bennett

I think in all of the arts there are just certain people that have a gift. I think it's a certain spirituality, it's a God-given gift that just certain individuals have. — Tony Bennett

I have always loved jazz music and as a teen growing up in New York City and then later on as an adult have great memories of the jazz clubs that were all located on 52nd Street. I still catch as many jazz shows as I can when I am in New York. And when I perform, I have my jazz quartet by my side. Jazz musicians keep things spontaneous and very "live," which is the way I like to perform. — Tony Bennett

"Benedetto" means the "blessed one" and I feel that I have truly been blessed. — Tony Bennett

I still feel that I can get better somehow. And I search for it all of the time. — Tony Bennett

I love entertaining people; I strive to make them feel good, and they make me feel wonderful. To explain it simply, I like what I do, and my ambition is to get better as I get older. That's really what I'm all about. — Tony Bennett

No-one will ever sound as good as Judy Garland as far as I am concerned. — Tony Bennett

To me, life is a gift, and it's a blessing to just be alive. And each person should learn what a gift it is to be alive no matter how tough things get. — Tony Bennett

The high point for me in my career was when Sinatra called me his favourite performer in the Fifties. And I've been sold out ever since. — Tony Bennett

Never treat the audience disrespectfully. — Tony Bennett

Johnny Mercer started Capitol Records, and he brought in Sinatra, Dean Martin, and Nat King Cole. He just let them sing whatever they wanted, and it became the best record company in America. — Tony Bennett

My whole premise has been, right from the beginning, that it would take me a lifetime to learn to explain myself as an artist. As you grow older, you learn what to do and what to leave out. You kind of simplify your work and get the same thing done with fewer strokes. It's pretty interesting to me. — Tony Bennett

I respected Ella Fitzgerald, Nat King Cole and Frank Sinatra. Those were my heroes, and they were 10 years older than I was. — Tony Bennett

I'd like to prove that if you take care of yourself, you can actually not regret the fact that you've become an old-timer, but you can just still improve and actually get better. — Tony Bennett

I left my heart in San Francisco, high on a hill, it calls to me. To be where little cable cars climb halfway to the stars, the morning fog may chill the air, I don't care. My love waits there in San Francisco, above the blue and windy sea, when I come home to you, San Francisco , your golden sun will shine for me. — Tony Bennett

If you follow your passion, you'll never work a day in your life. — Tony Bennett

Every city I go to is an opportunity to paint, whether it's Omaha or Hawaii. — Tony Bennett

That song helped make me a world citizen. It allowed me to live, work and sing in any city on the globe. It changed my whole life. — Tony Bennett

I know the history of the record business so well because I followed Billie Holiday into the record studios. It was so primitive compared to the sophisticated business today. — Tony Bennett

Lady Gaga is the Picasso of the entertainment world. She's very intelligent. — Tony Bennett

I'll never retire. — Tony Bennett

I was taught never to compromise: to never sing a cheap song. I never look down at the audience and think that they are ignorant or think that I'm more intelligent than they are. To think otherwise is totally incorrect and runs contrary to everything I was raised to believe. — Tony Bennett

I still get a little nervous before performing. You don't want to forget a lyric; you don't want to make a mistake. I still get butterflies. You can try to judge an audience, but you can only really judge things by the applause. — Tony Bennett

As a young boy, I did a lot of foolish things. I made a lot of mistakes. And you live and learn. — Tony Bennett

Singing is a gift. — Tony Bennett

Fame comes and goes. Longevity is the thing to aim for. — Tony Bennett

The bottom line of any country is: what did we contribute to the world? We contributed Louis Armstrong. — Tony Bennett

More than anybody else I'd like to thank Count Basie for teaching me how to perform. — Tony Bennett

I've taken stuff from people, too. You know though, if you steal from one person, you're just a thief. But if you steal from everyone, that's research. — Tony Bennett

Don't try to be just like some other singer hitting it big - find your own style and be honest in your performances. And never underestimate your audience. — Tony Bennett

It helps to know there is going to be continuity. — Tony Bennett

I am very much inspired by the great masters of entertainment: Bob Hope, George Burns, Jimmy Durante - who never thought about retiring. When people ask me if I plan to retire, I say, "Retire to what? I am doing what I love best right now!" — Tony Bennett

I plan to do my next two albums with Lady Gaga . She is quite a talent. — Tony Bennett

I study nature, and I realize that no matter how much you learn, you can't top nature. — Tony Bennett

Someday, when I'm awfully low, and the world is cold, I will feel a glow just thinking of you, and the way you look tonight. — Tony Bennett

I was possessed with a wonderful example of my Italian American family. They would come over and join us every Sunday, all my aunts and uncles and nephews and nieces, and I would sing for them. — Tony Bennett

I take care of myself. I work out three times a week. I have a trainer, and we just work out for an hour. — Tony Bennett

Every week, as an 11-year-old kid, I would tune in to what was really the first American Idol-type program, a radio show called 'Major Bowes' Amateur Hour.' The winning group on the evening of September 8, 1935, was called the Hoboken Four, and their spokesman was Frank Sinatra, then aged 19. — Tony Bennett

If something is good, it's always good. You don't have to change it. — Tony Bennett

My whole life has been singing and painting. I just do those two things. — Tony Bennett

When the uncreative tell the creative what to do, it stops being art. — Tony Bennett

We're in an era where the demand is for immediate hits that are destined to become obsolescent. Six months later, everyone forgets the artist and the tune. It's become like a con job. Producers, engineers, lawyers and accountants all make money, but the artists don't. — Tony Bennett

I grew up in an era where the record companies just sold records to everybody, and the whole family bought songs. — Tony Bennett

It's really quite a situation. It's ridiculous. I make $200,000, $300,000 a night. For years I was working little dives, and if I got $700 a week, I'd say, Wow, I'm really cooking. — Tony Bennett

I've been so fortunate because I never really had ups and downs as far as my career. Ninety-nine percent of the time, I've been sold out all over the world. — Tony Bennett

The whole music world is based on the young, the very young people. — Tony Bennett

To work is to feel alive. — Tony Bennett

I think there's an opportunity for a couple of them for sure, maybe more depending upon the situation, but it's too early to say which ones. It's a pretty competitive fight. And that doesn't mean the older guys are just going to walk into spots. I remind them all the time - you got to earn everything you get. And that's what made our team good last year, is guys really competed for opportunities and understood their roles. — Tony Bennett

I've been very fortunate. I'm doing what I love, and I'm getting away with it, you know? — Tony Bennett

I don't sing operatically, and I sing very intimately, but I still do the scales, and I think in terms of intonation and making sure that I'm hitting the notes right on the head ... and having it appear quite effortless. — Tony Bennett

Intimate singing had a wonderful style in the '30s and '40s. It came out of Broadway and the jazz of Louis Armstrong and Billie Holliday. But Sinatra created the best romantic era that we've ever had. — Tony Bennett

When you hear a great two-track of a performance in Carnegie Hall, let's say, it sounds like you're right there at that moment. It's true to reality. And the closer it gets, once it gets too technical, it becomes very tinny to hear notes. It doesn't sound right. It has to be natural. — Tony Bennett

I have been very fortunate to have been able to make a living from what I love to do best - performing and singing for people. — Tony Bennett

I have an awful lot to learn. My dream is to get better and better as I get older. — Tony Bennett

Sinatra invited me once to his birthday party in L.A. I was young, and I felt great about it. But when I got there, the Rat Pack were all in the kitchen laughing their heads off. — Tony Bennett

It's the kind of turn that happened to the great country of Germany, when Nazis came over and created tragic things, and they had to be told off. And if we continue this kind of violence and accept it in our country, the rest of the world's going to really take care of us, in a very bad way. — Tony Bennett

I have a simple life. I mean, you just give me a drum roll, they announce my name, and I come out and sing. In my job I have a contract that says I'm a singer. So I sing. — Tony Bennett

I loved Art Tatum! And, through him, and other different jazz musicians, I actually found my technique. — Tony Bennett

I think one of the reasons I'm popular again is because I'm wearing a tie. You have to be different. — Tony Bennett

When you get older, you don't have to eat a lot. I get my rest and sleep very well at night. It keeps me very balanced. — Tony Bennett

I'm not the type of person who likes to look backwards. I've always felt compelled to move forward and I've never been one to dwell in the past. All the people I've met, all the places I've been, and all the things that I've done have simply been part of who I am. — Tony Bennett

Gaga is a gorgeous singer, and when she sings a great ballad, I get goose bumps. — Tony Bennett

I get up, and boy, I can't wait to paint and study music and keep learning. I just love it. — Tony Bennett

I attended the High School of Industrial Arts and studied with many great artists as painting is something that you never stop learning about. Actually, in high school there was a time that I was thinking about just concentrating on painting and I asked my music teacher, Mr. Sondberg, for advice and he encouraged me to stick with the music as well. So all my life I have been singing and painting. — Tony Bennett

In America, at the beginning of talkies, they pulled Fred Astaire from the theaters and put him on the screen and had all of these great composers write songs for him. They call it the Great American Songbook; I call it the Fred Astaire Songbook because they were written for him. — Tony Bennett

I think if you have a passion for what you do then there are no limitations on how long or how much you can accomplish. — Tony Bennett