Quotes by Sufjan Stevens

About Sufjan Stevens:

Sufjan Stevens is an American singer-songwriter and multi-instrumentalist. He first came to wider recognition with the 2000 album, A Sun Came, which was released on the Asthmatic Kitty label he co-founded with his stepfather. He is perhaps best known for his 2005 album, Illinois, which hit number one on the Billboard Top Heatseekers chart, and for the single "Chicago".
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

It's traumatic to meditate on the availability of information through the Internet, or the way we perceive the world as a result. People don't experience things totally or viscerally anymore. It's all through representation, be it a record on YouTube...

Sufjan Stevens

Every time Jimmy Scott sings, it's the same but slightly different. I don't know how he does that or where he gets that from. I think it's instinct. Nothing he does is by chance; he's in complete control of what he's doing. He's just beautiful and un...

Sufjan Stevens

I am not naturally inclined to history or geography - maybe that's why I like to sing about it, because it helps me remember.

Sufjan Stevens

In third grade, I had to an oral report on the state of Oregon. I brought up Big Foot sightings, and I remember there was an argument about whether or not Big Foot was valid history. Ever since then I've been thinking about how subjective history is.

Sufjan Stevens

My music is just about story telling. I don't have much to say, and I'm not trying to change anyone's mind. I'm just singing through conviction about what I love and what I care about, starting with the very small.

Sufjan Stevens

I remember Detroit feeling really unsafe, feeling scared a lot. Our house was broken into, our car was stolen, we had to get a watchdog, we would get beat up in the street, I had my bike stolen. There was just a lot of real anarchy on the streets and...

Sufjan Stevens

I have a love/hate relationship with Amy Grant, but I do go back to her Christmas albums once in a while. They're dated and sentimental and the production is nearly unlistenable, but there's something about her vocal performance that just feels reall...

Sufjan Stevens

Morals, principles and laws are when faith is reduced to standards and those standards basically just bind us, and we become prejudicial, racist, self-serving when we're guided by these laws... When a developed country uses Christianity in its polici...

Sufjan Stevens

The spiritual ambiguity growing up made me really latch onto a faith - Protestantism - that was somewhat conventional. Everyone else was rebelling against traditions and institutions, whereas I was rebelling against the upheaval and uncertainty in my...

Sufjan Stevens

I feel like the Internet needs to be disarmed in some way. There needs to be a philosophical undermining of the Internet. We take it too seriously and too literally. For a reference we go to Wikipedia, which is full of inaccuracies and misinformation...

Sufjan Stevens

I was sort of born into a Subud cult that has ties to Islam and Indonesia and Middle Eastern spiritualism. My parents were kind of trial-and-error when it came to religion.

Sufjan Stevens

I love anything by Tchaikovsky. He was the real pop star of his day.

Sufjan Stevens

I wouldn't mind being popular in other ways, but not with music.

Sufjan Stevens

I believe that music is a spiritual language. My everyday self is pretty mundane and boring, but when I'm making music it allows for me to communicate a kind of transcendence that I can't communicate otherwise.

Sufjan Stevens

I find in music there's a space and a language I can use to express things in ways I can't describe conversationally.

Sufjan Stevens

I've been trying to challenge myself to be more explicit. I've always liked punk rock and Sonic Youth. I make that music privately, but I've never released it.

Sufjan Stevens

Pop music is so structured, and I'm excited to try and challenge that in my own work.

Sufjan Stevens

Musicians are often asked to answer for an entire culture, or for an entire movement. It's a process of commodification. It becomes packaged and summarized in a word like 'emo' or 'grunge'... or 'folk music.' I think that's just language itself, tryi...

Sufjan Stevens

Audacity is central to everything I do. A lot of times I think my work is about just seeing if I can get away with it.

Sufjan Stevens

A musician's attempt to summarize his or her work leads to all this prescriptive chatter, or what I call the 'Modifier's Madness.' A lot of adjectives working overtime.

Sufjan Stevens

Author Bio

  • NameSufjan Stevens
  • DescriptionAmerican singer-songwriter and multi-instrumentalis
  • BornJuly 1, 1975
  • CountryUnited States Of America
  • ProfessionSinger-songwriter; Composer; Oboist; Banjoist