Latest Solange Knowles Quotes from Interviews

Quotes about:

• Women face a lot of challenges every day - we have to stand firm in our walk and our intentions - but there are times when that weight feels too heavy, feels like a load that I just can't bear that day. I try to work through that in my art, whatever medium that might be. My live performance is based around the color red, and all the things that communicates as a woman to the world - fiery, really vocal, present, almost a kind of stubborn color - and redefining it as being very complex. Being able to express that complexity, I'm getting a lot better at that the older I've gotten.

  Solange Knowles

  Art, Challenges, Trying

  Source: www.cosmopolitan.com

• Style is the way we communicate who we are to people before we open our mouths.

  Solange Knowles

  People, Style, Communicate

  Source: www.cosmopolitan.com

• I'm really excited that the fashion industry is evolving, doing a much better job at representation, with women of color, women of different shapes, sizes, and creeds. It's been a long time coming... There were issues of tokenism, issues of misrepresentation. I'm optimistic that I see the change, the conversation that these archetypes gotta go. We can be very political and have long weaves down to our asses.

  Solange Knowles

  Fashion, Optimistic, Long

  Source: www.cosmopolitan.com

• One of the things I'm most proud of about myself is my ability to fail in front of the world. You have to have that attitude when you want to experiment in art, in music, in writing, or in fashion.

  Solange Knowles

  Fashion, Art, Attitude

  Source: www.cosmopolitan.com

• I'm probably on the internet way more than I should be. I don't know. I love connecting people. I love introducing people to other people who are doing incredible work in the world. And I'm just on the internet too damn much.

  Solange Knowles

  People, World, Internet

• I remember Björk saying that she felt like, no matter what stage in her career, if a man is credited on something that she's done, he's going to get the credit for it. And, unfortunately, that still rings true.

  Solange Knowles

  Men, Done, Remember

  Interview With Beyoncé, www.interviewmagazine.com. January 10, 2017.

• I was working through a lot of challenges at every angle of my life, and a lot of self-doubt, a lot of pity-partying. And I think every woman in her twenties has been there - where it feels like no matter what you are doing to fight through the thing that is holding you back, nothing can fill that void.

  Solange Knowles

  Fighting, Thinking, Challenges

  Interview With Beyoncé, www.interviewmagazine.com. January 10, 2017.

• So much of your identity in junior high is built on who you're with. You see the world through the lens of how you identify and have been identified at that time.

  Solange Knowles

  Identity, World

  Interview With Beyoncé, www.interviewmagazine.com. January 10, 2017.

• Our mother always taught us to be in control of our voice and our bodies and our work, and she showed us that through her example. If she conjured up an idea, there was not one element of that idea that she was not going to have her hand in. She was not going to hand that over to someone. And I think it's been an interesting thing to navigate, especially watching you do the same in all aspects of your work: Society labels that a control freak, an obsessive woman, or someone who has an inability to trust her team or to empower other people to do the work, which is completely untrue.

  Solange Knowles

  Mother, Team, Thinking

  Interview With Beyoncé, www.interviewmagazine.com. January 10, 2017.

• I remember being really young and having this voice inside that told me to trust my gut. And my gut has been really, really strong in my life. It's pretty vocal and it leads me.

  Solange Knowles

  Strong, Being Real, Remember

  Source: www.ebony.com

• [Beyoncé ] did a kickass job. You were the most patient, loving, wonderful sister ever. In the 30 years that we've been together, I think we've only really, like, butted heads ... we can count on one hand.

  Solange Knowles

  Jobs, Thinking, Hands

  Source: www.elle.com

• I just feel so much joy and gratitude that people have connected to it in this way. The biggest reward that I could ever get is seeing women, especially black women, talk about what this album ['A Seat at the Table'] has done, the solace it has given them.

  Solange Knowles

  Gratitude, People, Joy

  Source: www.elle.com

• There were things that had been weighing heavy on me for quite some time. And I went into this hole, trying to work through some of these things so that I could be a better me and be a better mom to Julez and be a better wife and a better friend and a better sister.

  Solange Knowles

  Mom, Wife, Trying

  Source: www.elle.com

• The album ['A Seat at the Table'] really feels like storytelling for us all and our family and our lineage.

  Solange Knowles

  Albums, Tables, Lineage

  Source: www.elle.com

• So over time, playing shows - after every show we would have pow-wow, I would have notes and we'd go over and we'd really restructure and re-do and now I feel really, really good about the show. But it's taken time.

  Solange Knowles

  Taken, Wow, Notes

  Source: www.npr.org

• I actually was a ballet dancer - I studied ballet from three until 13 - but like very seriously, that's what I wanted to do. I wanted to be a contemporary ballet dancer. I wanted to go to Juilliard.

  Solange Knowles

  Dancer, Ballet, Three

  "Solange Knowles On Nas, Juvenile And Dance Moves". "Microphone Check" with Ali Shaheed Muhammad, Frannie Kelley, www.npr.org. February 12, 2014.

• I've let go of being a super perfectionist on every single note and wanting the pitch to be absolutely perfect all of the time. I grew up watching the best of the best.

  Solange Knowles

  Letting Go, Perfect, Best Of The Best

  "Solange Knowles On Nas, Juvenile And Dance Moves". Interview with Frannie Kelley, www.wbur.org. February 12, 2014.

• I've also learned to only write songs and melodies that really work for my voice and that I won't have issues doing live. Because you can get really, really comfortable in the comping process: out of five takes, maybe one of those high notes that you struggled to do, nailed it, and then live you're having that challenge of really having to recreate that.

  Solange Knowles

  Song, Writing, Voice

  "Solange Knowles On Nas, Juvenile And Dance Moves". Interview with Frannie Kelley and Ali Shaheed Muhammad, www.npr.org. February 12, 2014.

• A lot of times I use live musicians, but I don't want it to have that live funky sound so I'll just take the best loop of a drum part and repeat it over and over and over again so that there's consistency and it feels a little bit more programmed. But I have a love/hate relationship with comping as well.

  Solange Knowles

  Hate, Consistency, Want

  "Solange Knowles On Nas, Juvenile And Dance Moves". Interview with Frannie Kelley and Ali Shaheed Muhammad, www.npr.org. February 12, 2014.

• I actually produced other people's vocals for a long time when I first signed my publishing deal and I had just sort of decided that I only wanted to be a writer. I would be in all of these writing sessions, and a lot of times my publisher would say, "You should get a demo singer to sing it because then it doesn't identify as a Solange song."

  Solange Knowles

  Song, Writing, Long

  "Solange Knowles On Nas, Juvenile And Dance Moves". Interview with Frannie Kelley, www.wbur.org. February 12, 2014.

• My parents only played Isley Brothers, Marvin Gaye. That's when New Kids came out, and we wanted to jam that. My mom was like, "Put that thing off and put my damn record on". So from old school to '90s to recent, it's just always been there.

  Solange Knowles

  Mom, Brother, Old School

  Source: www.npr.org

• There's just so, so many overlooked R&B artists and I think it's really about, again, being sensitive to whatever you're addressing culturally. I just always try to have a sensitivity to it and what that might make someone feel.

  Solange Knowles

  Artist, Thinking, Trying

  "Solange Knowles On Nas, Juvenile And Dance Moves". Interview with Frannie Kelley and Ali Shaheed Muhammad, www.npr.org. February 12, 2014.

• There's a lot of situations where I feel irony involved when R&B and hip-hop is expressed in the indie worlds. There's a lot of times when I feel like the juxtaposition becomes a thing.

  Solange Knowles

  Hip Hop, World, Juxtaposition

  "Solange Knowles On Nas, Juvenile And Dance Moves". "Microphone Check" with Ali Shaheed Muhammad, Frannie Kelley, www.npr.org. February 12, 2014.

• I'm a fan of hip-hop and I love it, I by no means am an expert on it.

  Solange Knowles

  Mean, Hip Hop, Fans

  "Solange Knowles On Nas, Juvenile And Dance Moves". "Microphone Check" with Ali Shaheed Muhammad, Frannie Kelley, www.npr.org. February 12, 2014.

• I always have looked at "indie" as a term of "independence." Never associated a sonic gesture with that in the same way that pop music has always meant "popular" to me it didn't define a sound. And I think now that has been the context for things. If something is indie, it almost has this sonic association with it, or pop has become this term of shame almost, like, bubblegum sweet pop.

  Solange Knowles

  Sweet, Thinking, Independence

  "Solange Knowles On Nas, Juvenile And Dance Moves". Interview with Frannie Kelley, www.wbur.org. February 12, 2014.