John Lennon

Possession isn’t nine-tenths of the law. It’s nine-tenths of the problem.

Time you enjoy wasting is not wasted.

I’ve had the boyhood thing of being Elvis. Now I want to be with my best friend, and my best friend’s my wife. Who could ask for anything more?

Life is what happens while you are busy making other plans.

You have to be a bastard to make it, and that’s a fact. And the Beatles are the biggest bastards on earth.

If being an egomaniac means I believe in what I do and in my art or music, then in that respect you can call me that… I believe in what I do, and I’ll say it.

Listening is the key to everything good in music.

You blows who you is.

I play as I feel.

Jazz musician is a combination entertainer, poet, singer, educator, student, artist, seducer and all-round good fellow.

Invest yourself in everything you do. There’s fun in being serious.

If the audience doesn’t hear what is going on, is it going on?

There are a million good tunes.

We recorded to document ourselves, not to sell a lot of records.

In the 1990s, with Mariah Carey, Whitney Houston, those really big female artists were very glamorous, it was all about the glamour at that time. And so there was a big switch, the desire to be more who you were, not so beholden to this whole standard of beauty. It was a liberation. You see Mary J Blige – she did the same, wearing the combat boots.

Dizzy used to tell me I’m playing too hard. He’d say to not give everything. Miles told me that too.

Sometimes there are no gigs, but the main thing is still the music.

The Blues? It’s the mother of American music. That’s what is is – the source.

Many people forget that Jazz, no matter what form it takes, must come from the heart as well as the mind.

The wonderful thing about Jazz is its willingness to take chances.

Audiences are smart. They are not going to come out to see you unless you are honest.