Diane Schuurs

Maybe the best is yet to come, but I’ve already had the best.

I wrote “Pilot of My Destiny” because of my love of flying. The fact that my brother is a pilot inspired me to write it. I call him pilot. He calls me copilot.

I’ve already done so much. The rest is just gravy, it’s like frosting on the cake

[on Frank Sinatra] He was a compassionate guy. He loved to have fun. He had a movie theatre in his house. We munched on popcorn and watched movies together.

I met up with George Shearing about a year before my mother passed away. When I was 11 years old, Mama took me to the Edgewater Inn in Seattle and I was able to sit down and play piano for George and a lot of (the set list) was songs I had heard from the album, ‘Concerto For My Love.’ Then, after Mama died, my dad and I went to actually hear him perform at the Edgewater Inn when I was 12. Oh my gosh! It just really got me into playing piano.

My career has been a combination of hard work and timing. Working with Stevie Wonder at the Kennedy Center Honors was timing. The Tonight Show was timing. Carnegie Hall, that was timing. My marriage was timing. I was ready, I wanted to know what it was like.

I absolutely adore and idolize women. All women. I think they are all amazing. The female musicians I’ve met have been far more inspiring than the male ones. Women tend to be much more creative and ambitious. I think I may have been a woman in a past life.

I think they can co-exist. You don’t have to put one down for another. I’ve been bitten by the acting bug, and where it takes me, it won’t take away from the music.

Gay people don’t actually try to convert people. That’s Jehovah’s Witnesses you’re thinking of.

I think I’m prone to panic.

I really had to think and learn about musical intervals.

I come from the tradition of a big Irish family that loves to sing. I love to perform.

If there was no ladies, I wouldn’t wanna be on the planet. Ladies, friends, and music – without those three, I wouldn’t wanna be here.

People think clowns – I wasn’t a clown. I would run parties. I basically ran around for two hours and ate massive piles of Haribo.

I’m not that good looking… nobody is that good looking. I have seen a lot of movie stars, and maybe four are amazing looking. The rest have a team of gay guys who make it happen.

There are some people in here who are not journalists. There’s a masseuse in here who’s not a journalist – I think that’s ever so exciting.

I think the way for me to win America’s heart is to perform, and if I really was concerned about breaking big then there’d be a tour.

You have to learn that if you start making sure you feel good, everything will be okay.

I do think things were meant to happen. I’m just this little girl from Tennessee, and here I am today. I think a lot of things are just out of your hands.

I like you baby, just not more than my work right now

Once you get rid of the idea that you must please other people before you please yourself, and you begin to follow your own instincts – only then can you be successful. You become more satisfied, and when you are, other people will tend to be satisfied by what you do.