I also had a brother who was like me a musician and a composer. A man of great talent, far more gifted than I. He died very young... he killed himself in the prime of his life. ↗
I just think it's a blessing that I was able to have the gift of words and to be able to put them into music. I was given a great gift all the way around. I didn't ever have to really go out and look for songs, you know. ↗
What is hard to remember when you're in the middle of it is that when you get through to the other side, you always walk away with a gift. If you can stand in there and not walk away from it, you get transformed by it. ↗
If we are to achieve a richer culture, rich in contrasting values, we must recognize the whole gamut of human potentialities, and so weave a less arbitrary social fabric, one in which each diverse human gift will find a fitting place. ↗
Well, because I have twin seven-year-old boys, I enjoy the gift giving stuff a great deal. We do both Hanukkah and Christmas, so it is a costly, though extremely pleasing proposition. ↗
Though everything else may appear shallow and repulsive, even the smallest task in music is so absorbing, and carries us so far away from town, country, earth, and all worldly things, that it is truly a blessed gift of God. ↗
Hell begins on the day when God grants us a clear vision of all that we might have achieved, of all the gifts which we have wasted, of all that we might have done which we did not do. ↗
