Charlie Parker

I kept thinking there’s bound to be something else? I could hear it sometimes, but I couldn’t play it.

In Kansas City joints ran 9pm-5am. Pay was a $1.25 a night but somebody special like Count Basie could command $1.50.

I am a devout musician.

You’ve got to learn your instrument. Then, you practice, practice, practice. And then, when you finally get up there on the bandstand, forget all that and just wail.

Master your instrument, master the music and then forget all that and just play.

I realized by using the high notes of the chords as a melodic line, and by the right harmonic progression, I could play what I heard inside me. That’s when I was born.

[Stratocaster vs Les Paul] It’s a totally different animal. One is for very subtle and, I would say, more musical things that you can distract and abuse. You can’t do that with a Les Paul. It’s too delicate. It’s got a very delicate tone; most people don’t ever realize that because they are plugged into monstrous amplifiers which completely, instantaneously covers up the unique sound quality it has. All those years of development go straight out the window when you overload the amp.

I sought some kind of freedom in music, in the promise of transcendence and the idea that the purity and the innocence of a mythical god could somehow deliver me from darkness.

Jazz is a work in progress. We’ll be defining traditions in Jazz for 200-300 years.

Jazz is a white term to define black people. My music is black classical music.

I remember Elvis as a young man hanging around the Sun Studios. Even then, I knew this kid had a tremendous talent. He was a dynamic young boy. His phraseology, his way of looking at a song, was as unique as Sinatra’s. I was a tremendous fan, and had Elvis lived, there would have been no end to his inventiveness.

It’s a matter of who would be right for each song. Mickey Hart for ‘All We Need is An Island’ – he’s the only guy I know who has Tahitian drums and every kind of drum on the planet.

Seemed to me that drumming was the best way to get close to God.

You know why I quit playing ballads? Cause I love playing ballads.

A drummer has to be kind-hearted.

Jazz speaks for life. This is triumphant music.

I have no one style.

No one is original. Everyone is derivative.

I think I’ve tried to stay true to my music since the beginning. It’s kind of hard because of the access and technology but I just do what I do.

I’m trying to play the truth of what I am. The reason it’s difficult is ’cause I’m changing all the time.

In composition you have all the time you want to decide what to say in 15 seconds, in improvisation you have 15 seconds.