Quotes by Gil Scott-Heron

About Gil Scott-Heron:

Gilbert is concerned with the origin of the blues." His music, most notably on Pieces of a Man and Winter in America in the early 1970s, influenced and helped engender later African-American music genres such as hip hop and neo soul.
A B C D E F G H I J K L M N O P Q R S T U V W X Y Z

I was one of the first three black students to go to an all-white school in Tennessee.

Gil Scott-Heron

You should be able to do anything you can afford as an adult.

Gil Scott-Heron

I don't mind being criticized. I enjoy being criticized personally, not by rumor.

Gil Scott-Heron

I cannot afford to watch Fox News.

Gil Scott-Heron

I found my grandmother dead. It shook me up. I got up to make her breakfast, and I knew it was strange that she wasn't stirring. I went in to wake her, and she was laying in rigor mortis, and I'm done. I called next door, and the kid picked up the ph...

Gil Scott-Heron

You see, revolution sounds like something that happens, like turning on the light switch, but actually it's moving a large obstacle, and a lot of folks' efforts to push it in one direction or the other have to combine.

Gil Scott-Heron

I learnt early on that your audience take the songs in the way they want to rather than the way you might want them too.

Gil Scott-Heron

My songs were always about the tone of voice rather than the words.

Gil Scott-Heron

Well, I grew up on the blues, man!

Gil Scott-Heron

Man is a complex being: he makes deserts bloom - and lakes die.

Gil Scott-Heron

All the dreams you show up in are not your own.

Gil Scott-Heron

I've always had questions about what it meant to be a protester, to be in the minority. Are the people who are trying to find peace, who are trying to have the Constitution apply to everybody, are they really the radicals? We're not protesting from t...

Gil Scott-Heron

Every once in a while, you live long enough to get the respect that people didn't want to give while you were trying to become a senior citizen.

Gil Scott-Heron

Everything that's bad for you catches on too quickly in America, because that's the easiest thing to get people to invest in, the pursuits that are easy and destructive, the ones that bring out the least positive aspects of people.

Gil Scott-Heron

Schedule? I have no schedule. There is no hurry. I work when I want to.

Gil Scott-Heron

I was born in Chicago, but I was raised in a town called Jackson, Tennessee. And a lot of these changes that were necessary and talked about it as important have been made, like, people go to school where they want to go. They work for equal pay, the...

Gil Scott-Heron

Author Bio

  • NameGil Scott-Heron
  • DescriptionAmerican musician, poet and author
  • AliasesGlibert Scott-Heron; Gil Scott Heron
  • BornApril 1, 1949
  • DiedMay 27, 2011
  • CountryUnited States Of America
  • ProfessionSinger; Author
  • AwardsGrammy Lifetime Achievement Award