1.
Faith and prayer are the vitamins of the soul; man cannot live in health without them.
Mahalia Jackson
2.
Gospel music rhythms are not African in origin, although I know that's what the jazz experts say.
Mahalia Jackson
3.
When you sing gospel you have a feeling there is a cure for what's wrong.
Mahalia Jackson
4.
It is easy to be independent when you've got money. But to be independent when you haven't got a thing, that's the Lord's test.
Mahalia Jackson
5.
God can make you anything you want to be, but you have to put everything in his hands.
Mahalia Jackson
6.
Baby, black promoters oppressed me before white promoters ever got hold of me. Don't talk skin to me.
Mahalia Jackson
7.
Gospel songs are the songs of hope. When you sing gospel you have the feeling there is a cure for what's wrong, but when you are through with the blues, you've got nothing to rest on.
Mahalia Jackson
8.
I sing God's music because it makes me feel free. It gives me hope. With the blues, when you finish, you still have the blues.
Mahalia Jackson
9.
Without a song, each day would be a century.
Mahalia Jackson
10.
Someday the sun is going to shine down on me in some faraway place.
Mahalia Jackson
11.
The mind and the voice by themselves are not sufficient.
Mahalia Jackson
12.
I close my eyes when I sing so I can feel the song better.
Mahalia Jackson
13.
If you believe in God, He will open the windows of heaven and pour blessings upon you.
Mahalia Jackson
14.
How can you sing of Amazing Grace? How can you sing prayerfully of heaven and earth and all God's wonders without using your hands?
Mahalia Jackson
15.
Do you know most of the Jewish songs have the same trend of sadness as Negro spirituals?
Mahalia Jackson
16.
Money just draws flies.
Mahalia Jackson
17.
If you want me to sing this Christmas song with the feeling and the meaning, you better see if you can locate that check.
Mahalia Jackson
18.
One thing about playing the real jazz is that you can't count it.
Mahalia Jackson
19.
The old Devil gets mad when you're trying to do good. Pray that God will move the stumbling blocks.
Mahalia Jackson
20.
You're blessed if you have the strength to work.
Mahalia Jackson
21.
When you are through with the blues, you've got nothing to rest on.
Mahalia Jackson
22.
My hands, my feet, I throw my whole body to say all that is within me.
Mahalia Jackson
23.
Sometimes you ask God for something and you don't know what you're asking.
Mahalia Jackson
24.
Blues are the songs of despair, but gospel songs are the songs of hope.
Mahalia Jackson
25.
I don't worry too much about the script, I just ad lib, like Pearl Bailey.
Mahalia Jackson
26.
The Lord doesn't like us to be dead. Be alive. Sometimes I dance to the glory of the Lord, because He said so.
Mahalia Jackson
27.
If you don't like Louis Armstrong, you don't know how to love.
Mahalia Jackson
28.
Time is important to me because I want to sing long enough to leave a message. I'm used to singing in churches where nobody would dare stop me until the Lord arrives!
Mahalia Jackson
29.
Gospel music in those days of the early 1930s was really taking wing. It was the kind of music colored people had left behind them down South and they liked it because it was just like a letter from home.
Mahalia Jackson
30.
Blues are the songs of despair.
Mahalia Jackson
31.
Anybody singing the blues is in a deep pit yelling for help.
Mahalia Jackson
32.
They thought I was a success as soon as I started paying the bills.
Mahalia Jackson
33.
The trouble with records is that they're too short.
Mahalia Jackson
34.
Everybody needs somebody.
Mahalia Jackson
35.
Put your mind on the gospel. And remember - there's one God for all.
Mahalia Jackson
36.
A great influence in my life was the sanctified or Holiness churches...Everybody in there sang and they clapped and stomped heir feet and sang with their whole body... Their music was so strong and expressive, it used to bring tears to my eyes.
Mahalia Jackson
37.
I'll come to any benefit if I see SCLC get all the money.
Mahalia Jackson
38.
This is the place to see the stars - Hollywood Bowl.
Mahalia Jackson
39.
I hope to bring people to God with my songs.
Mahalia Jackson
