Mitch Leigh

I grew up in Brownsville; most of the kids I grew up with went to jail, not Yale. If they had heard of Yale, they thought it was a lock to pick.

You can't make money on advertising; you just have to seed the clouds. What you're after is word of mouth.

There's more musical freedom on Madison Avenue than anywhere else. It's an Eden for a composer.

I was in the army, and I had given up the thought of being a composer.

To call somebody a Jewish composer is obviously redundant.

When you think of Mitch Leigh as a businessman, remember he's also a composer. And when you think of Mitch Leigh as a composer, remember he's also a businessman.

If you're not a nice person, don't call.

If one wants to go on living, one must evolve. Before, when we composed, we would start by a series of music themes. Once created, we would hire writers and lyricists to make up the text and the story line. I was the first to do this backwards with 'Man of La Mancha.'

I think if you see that no one is going to laugh at you for it, I think the concept of living nicely will be infectious. I believe there is room for the absence of cynicism.

One doesn't go on television for the Manhattan crowd. You buy the sides of buses for that.

My advice to singers is always the same: 'Don't sing the song, sing the lyric.'

You have to do what is real and what is right and what is good and what you believe in. It doesn't mean it's always going to work. It doesn't. But when it does, it is truthful and forever.