I remember when I thought of singing as the bit that went between the guitar playing – something I couldn’t wait to get out of the way. Singing was originally like a chore that I didn’t really enjoy. – Eric Clapton
The blues are what I’ve turned to, what has given me inspiration and relief in all the trials of my life. – Eric Clapton
It was stumbling on to really the bible of the blues, you know, and a very powerful drug to be introduced to us and I absorbed it totally, and it changed my complete outlook on music. – Eric Clapton
From the beginning, I knew intuitively that if nothing else, music was safe, and that nobody could tell me anything about it. Music didn’t need a middleman, whereas all the other things in school needed some kind of explanation. – Eric Clapton
They looked great, you know the drawings of the guys playing looked great and bits of string around their necks. So it didn’t seem to be that difficult a thing to do, or that inaccessible. – Eric Clapton
I think everybody has their own way of looking at their lives as some kind of pilgrimage. Some people will see their role as a pilgrim in terms of setting up a fine family, or establishing a business inheritance. Everyone’s got their own definition. Mine, I suppose, is to know myself. – Eric Clapton
Leave bands, go back to obscurity if I choose to, without a great sense of loss of security because it’s all been based on the fact that I did it on my own or was doing, enjoying doing it on my own in the first place. – Eric Clapton
I did play a lot of fingerstyle when I first started playing. I could never really find the right combination of flatpick or fingerpick, so playing fingerstyle is really the easiest way – though it’s quite strenuous on the fingertips. – Eric Clapton
Very much like that, and very much a loner, do you know and I didn’t fit really into sport or all kind of group activities as a kid, I couldn’t find a niche. And music was not really part of the kind of village curriculum it would, you know. – Eric Clapton
I mean, it didn’t matter to me that there were people, it didn’t matter that I was shy Just the sound was so captivating that it helped me to get rid of those inhibitions. – Eric Clapton
When all the original blues guys are gone, you start to realize that someone has to tend to the tradition. I recognize that I have some responsibility to keep the music alive, and it’s a pretty honorable position to be in. – Eric Clapton
One summer I remember, I got exposed to Chuck Berry and Buddy Holly and Buddy Holly was a very very big, made a very big impression on me. Because of a lot of things, you know, the way he looked and his charisma. – Eric Clapton
In playing, I suppose my greatest gift was to express the way I felt or the willingness to express myself. – Eric Clapton
I used to do crazy things that people would bail me out of, and I’m just grateful that I survived. But the music got very lost; I didn’t know where I was going, and I didn’t really care. I was more into just having a good time, and I think it showed. – Eric Clapton
I’d love to knock an audience cold with one note, but what do you do for the rest of the evening? – Eric Clapton
I’ve got the god given talent or the god given opportunity better put, to let that out in a harmless way you know, and I don’t know what it does to you, I don’t really know. – Eric Clapton
My dedication to my music has driven everyone away. I’ve had girlfriends, but I always end up on my own. I don’t particularly like it, but I don’t see a way ’round it. – Eric Clapton
But I did go to music really early on, even when I was 4 or 5, I was responding to music probably in ways other kids were not. – Eric Clapton
The toughest thing about being a celebrity, I suppose, is being polite when I don’t want to be. – Eric Clapton
I just managed to convince my grandmother that it was a worth while that was something to do, you know, and when I did finally get the guitar, it didn’t seem that difficult to me, to be able to make a good noise out of it. – Eric Clapton
Given the choice between accomplishing something and just lying around, I’d rather lie around. No contest. – Eric Clapton
I mean, the sound of an amplified guitar in a room full of people was so hypnotic and addictive to me, that I could cross any kind of border to get on there. – Eric Clapton
Although they can do it all the time, you know, they’re far better than me, on a musically, on a theoretical music level. You know, they’re out of my league. – Eric Clapton
A British pressing with a compilation of the best stuff really, I mean actually not only that but, these were all kind of semi hits for the people on it in America. – Eric Clapton
