I like the Beatles very much, and there are certain things about the Stones that I like.
— Leon Russell
I'm happy to have a job. I play a little, write a little, perform some. It's not like it's an engineered, well-manufactured plan or anything. I just do what I do.
I think probably my main advice to new artists is if you want to be in the music business, you need to be dang serious about it because it's a rough business.
I love bipolar people.
My chops have always been sort of weak, because the right side of my body was paralyzed a little bit. It was very limiting. I have to design stuff I can play, and it took me a year and a half to figure out how to hold a guitar pick.
I was playing with George Harrison one time, and George loves takes. This song was up to Take 160. I said, 'George, do you want me to play the same thing or 160 different things?' It drove me crazy because, in general, I'm ready to play my part.
I wish I had gone into industrial plumbing. That's a joke.
I'm pretty serious about what I do.
Both economics and politics are false sciences.
I'm almost totally politically inactive.
I don't think there's any danger of me playing Indian music. However, I did a song of George Harrison's 'Beware of Darkness' that was kind of like that. That was an illusion. I was playing that on a thumbtack piano, and Jim Gordon was playing tablas. He's an amazing player. That was as close to India as I ever got.
Karen Carpenter was just a singularly amazing singer. There was just not anybody like her.
For years and years, I would sit in my studio, and I wouldn't have any inspiration. I'd write one or two songs a year.
I started out playing 'Chopsticks.'
I was on the road with Jerry Lee Lewis when I was 15 - I can't imagine not doing it. That's what I do.
I am happy with what comes, I don't have expectations of any stature.
I didn't start out to become famous, so when it disappeared, I thought, well, that happens sometimes.
I played on a few Frank Sinatra sessions.
I'm not so much of a person for causes, unless I specifically - for instance, if it's my cause, or some poor people's, I'll try to help. But you won't find me playing for any peace candidates - or any candidates.
My hobby is silence.
I belonged to the Columbia Record Club, and that's where my records came from. For some reason, I was in the 'jazz' category. I got Benny Goodman records and Miles Davis, J.J. Johnson and Kai Winding, and that kind of stuff. I really was not a jazz guy at all, but I knew some of those names.
Sometimes one misses the sign posts as you're going down the road. They aren't as obvious as they become when you get to the end of the road, so to speak.
I was always trying to write standards, songs that anybody can sing. I figured that's where the money was.
I have damaged nerve endings on the right side, so my piano style comes from designing stuff I can play with my right hand. And some of it effectively mimics classical stuff.
My feet are giving out on me. But I have a wheelchair that folds out on my tour bus. I've also got this little tricycle, so if I want to go someplace, I get those out.
I would have to say Sam Cooke is the one I admired most. His artistry and vocal, just the way he did it.
I had a band with David Gates. There was just a lot of opportunity at that time. But I left for Los Angeles the week after I graduated high school, and I actually left to try to get into the advertising business. That was really why I went out to L.A. My music career was almost an accident.
I've always felt I struck out with Doris Day. Her son, Terry Melcher, was a producer I worked for at Columbia, and one day, he asked me to go to her house to play piano on a song she was doing. So I get there, and she has about 30 dogs running around the place - turns out she's a dog rescuer.
If everybody'd agree to quit using money, I'd be happy to play for free every day for awhile. But I don't play benefits or any kind of fund-raisers. I prefer to play at hospitals, for people who otherwise can't see us. But I can't see playing for causes, whatever the cause may be.
I've avoided the press and a lot of stuff that would have made me more visible just because it's not my style.
