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Top 25 Danny Elfman Quotes (2025 Update)

Danny Elfman Quote: “For me, writing something in the spirit of Halloween is like Mother Teresa writing on charity and sacrifice. It’s just second nature to me.”

1. “For me, writing something in the spirit of Halloween is like Mother Teresa writing on charity and sacrifice. It’s just second nature to me.”

— Danny Elfman

Danny Elfman Quote: “In Tim’s films, more than most, if you miss the tone, you don’t get the film.”

2. “In Tim’s films, more than most, if you miss the tone, you don’t get the film.”

— Danny Elfman

Danny Elfman Quote: “It’s hard to get a film, you know, you need a very special film to be able to get that experimental. But, I would love to see that happen. I would love the opportunity to be more experimental than I am.”

3. “It’s hard to get a film, you know, you need a very special film to be able to get that experimental. But, I would love to see that happen. I would love the opportunity to be more experimental than I am.”

— Danny Elfman

Danny Elfman Quote: “In some types of music I’m working out all the chords one bar at a time – the whole structure, because it’s about that. And there are other pieces which are really about – okay, the melody is going to start here and play through to here.”

4. “In some types of music I’m working out all the chords one bar at a time – the whole structure, because it’s about that. And there are other pieces which are really about – okay, the melody is going to start here and play through to here.”

— Danny Elfman

Danny Elfman Quote: “The first thing I do is lay out that melody and figure out how it has to hold here and then finish to land here, because you know in advance you’re going to want the melody to catch four things in the action.”

5. “The first thing I do is lay out that melody and figure out how it has to hold here and then finish to land here, because you know in advance you’re going to want the melody to catch four things in the action.”

— Danny Elfman

Danny Elfman Quote: “So, it becomes an exercise in futility if you write something that does not express the film as the director wishes. It’s still their ball game. It’s their show. I think any successful composer learns how to dance around the director’s impulses.”

6. “So, it becomes an exercise in futility if you write something that does not express the film as the director wishes. It’s still their ball game. It’s their show. I think any successful composer learns how to dance around the director’s impulses.”

— Danny Elfman

Danny Elfman Quote: “Nothing bad ever happens, why should I care?”

7. “Nothing bad ever happens, why should I care?”

— Danny Elfman

Danny Elfman Quote: “The idea of performing some of Jack Skellington’s songs from The Nightmare Before Christmas live for the very first time is immensely exciting.”

8. “The idea of performing some of Jack Skellington’s songs from The Nightmare Before Christmas live for the very first time is immensely exciting.”

— Danny Elfman

Danny Elfman Quote: “You hear the beginning of a melody, you should kind of know it’s going to lead down this path. It should start feeling like a friend, like familiar.”

9. “You hear the beginning of a melody, you should kind of know it’s going to lead down this path. It should start feeling like a friend, like familiar.”

— Danny Elfman

Danny Elfman Quote: “This is Halloween, everybody make a scene Trick or treat till the neighbors gonna die of fright It’s our town, everybody scream In this town of Halloween.”

10. “This is Halloween, everybody make a scene Trick or treat till the neighbors gonna die of fright It’s our town, everybody scream In this town of Halloween.”

— Danny Elfman

Danny Elfman Quote: “It all depends on the directors. Working closely with a director is the main job of a film composer. Interpreting what he perceives as a color, an emotion or mood is very abstract. A director tells you something he wants and then you have to run back.”

11. “It all depends on the directors. Working closely with a director is the main job of a film composer. Interpreting what he perceives as a color, an emotion or mood is very abstract. A director tells you something he wants and then you have to run back.”

— Danny Elfman

Danny Elfman Quote: “Sometimes on a film you just become taken with the fact that, all right this is as rough as it gets, but I’m going to support my general and I’m going to do the very best I can for him because he’s a good general and I like him.”

12. “Sometimes on a film you just become taken with the fact that, all right this is as rough as it gets, but I’m going to support my general and I’m going to do the very best I can for him because he’s a good general and I like him.”

— Danny Elfman

Danny Elfman Quote: “It sounds really stupid, I hate making cosmic comments like this but, I just let it do what it wants to do.”

13. “It sounds really stupid, I hate making cosmic comments like this but, I just let it do what it wants to do.”

— Danny Elfman

Danny Elfman Quote: “You’ll never get me into a tux. Not until I’m dead and I have no choice because that’s what the undertaker put me in.”

14. “You’ll never get me into a tux. Not until I’m dead and I have no choice because that’s what the undertaker put me in.”

— Danny Elfman

Danny Elfman Quote: “I would have to say I might do some stuff, but it’s the film that’s appealing. I was raised on film. My musical experience is all via film, it’s not from classical music.”

15. “I would have to say I might do some stuff, but it’s the film that’s appealing. I was raised on film. My musical experience is all via film, it’s not from classical music.”

— Danny Elfman

Danny Elfman Quote: “I’m trying to interpret the film through the director’s head, but it all comes out through me. So, a composer is kind of like a psychic medium.”

16. “I’m trying to interpret the film through the director’s head, but it all comes out through me. So, a composer is kind of like a psychic medium.”

— Danny Elfman

Danny Elfman Quote: “I think that’s one of the things that has always put me in kind of an odd niche. It’s that all of my understanding of orchestral music is via film, not via classical music like it’s supposed to be. To me it’s the same, it doesn’t make any difference.”

17. “I think that’s one of the things that has always put me in kind of an odd niche. It’s that all of my understanding of orchestral music is via film, not via classical music like it’s supposed to be. To me it’s the same, it doesn’t make any difference.”

— Danny Elfman

Danny Elfman Quote: “I think that there’s a lot more freedom in the low budget, the independent films where, unfortunately, you don’t have the money, necessarily, to get the orchestras in there to play a lot of stuff. But, you have a lot more freedom, very often.”

18. “I think that there’s a lot more freedom in the low budget, the independent films where, unfortunately, you don’t have the money, necessarily, to get the orchestras in there to play a lot of stuff. But, you have a lot more freedom, very often.”

— Danny Elfman

Danny Elfman Quote: “Most often the music does end up in the movie, and sometimes there’s a point where I wish that it wasn’t, just because I think the score would be more effective if there was less of it. But, again, that’s not my call.”

19. “Most often the music does end up in the movie, and sometimes there’s a point where I wish that it wasn’t, just because I think the score would be more effective if there was less of it. But, again, that’s not my call.”

— Danny Elfman

Danny Elfman Quote: “I had to do this very aggressive, big score in a very short time, and knowing that in the beginning, middle, and end would be this very, very famous theme, but I still had to weave a score around it and make it work as a score was really challenging.”

20. “I had to do this very aggressive, big score in a very short time, and knowing that in the beginning, middle, and end would be this very, very famous theme, but I still had to weave a score around it and make it work as a score was really challenging.”

— Danny Elfman

Danny Elfman Quote: “Oh see, first off you gotta realize – everything for me is a reconstruction or deconstruction. I would actually say deconstruction. Mission: Impossible would be the exception. That would be a reconstruction- deconstruction.”

21. “Oh see, first off you gotta realize – everything for me is a reconstruction or deconstruction. I would actually say deconstruction. Mission: Impossible would be the exception. That would be a reconstruction- deconstruction.”

— Danny Elfman

Danny Elfman Quote: “You have to write a good score that you feel good about. At least, you’re supposed to. But, if the director hates it, it ain’t going to be in the movie!”

22. “You have to write a good score that you feel good about. At least, you’re supposed to. But, if the director hates it, it ain’t going to be in the movie!”

— Danny Elfman

Danny Elfman Quote: “Or certainly I would need time – which I would love to have but there almost never is on a film – to just spend a week with a roomful of guys laying down these patterns.”

23. “Or certainly I would need time – which I would love to have but there almost never is on a film – to just spend a week with a roomful of guys laying down these patterns.”

— Danny Elfman

Danny Elfman Quote: “I don’t see myself necessarily having a burning desire to write a symphony.”

24. “I don’t see myself necessarily having a burning desire to write a symphony.”

— Danny Elfman

Danny Elfman Quote: “Doing Tim’s film is always going to be the most pleasure. Let me just put it that way. So, without drawing favorites one way or the other, getting back with him and doing Mars Attacks! was certainly a special treat.”

25. “Doing Tim’s film is always going to be the most pleasure. Let me just put it that way. So, without drawing favorites one way or the other, getting back with him and doing Mars Attacks! was certainly a special treat.”

— Danny Elfman

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