Alicia Keys

"I want to continue to produce film, television, and theater, and to make the most amazing music that I've made in my life."

"I'm a very positive person, but this whole concept of having to always be nice, always smiling, always happy, that's not real. It was like I was wearing a mask. I was becoming this perfectly chiselled sculpture, and that was bad. That took a long time to understand."

"I've learned that while I'd be a fool not to stay open to the advice and experiences of the smart, amazing people in my life, I also need to listen to what I have to say."

"I've stepped more into my womanhood, I'm a mother now, I'm having a beautiful relationship as a wife and as a friend."

"If I want to be alone, some place I can write, I can read, I can pray, I can cry, I can do whatever I want - I go to the bathroom."

"Maturity and experience are part of my liberation."

"My mom always said, 'Don't date a guy who thinks he's prettier than you.'"

"My mom is definitely my rock."

"Soul music is timeless."

"The desire to play has always been in me. I remember my first experience at about four or five of really dying to sing and dying to play that came from no one telling me to do so."

"When I was first learning songs, I'd have a favorite song, and I'd take the chords and twist them around. I'd learn the chords and then play them backward. That was my first experimenting with writing a song."