Theodor W. Adorno

I compulsively reach for perfection in music, often at the expense of everything else in my life.

If you feel like tapping your feet, tap your feet.

It’s taken me all my life to learn what not to play.

All we are saying is give peace a chance.

I am only a mixture of countless influences and thanks to that I am able to find my own style of playing.

As soon as it was understood that we could handle things in our own way, it was the thrill of my life to walk out on that stage with people just hemming the band in.

Everybody came. Everybody came to the Cotton Club.

Risk is at the heart of Jazz. Every note we play is a risk.

You know the actor John Garfield? In one movie he walked up to this train station, the ticket booth, and the guy says, ‘Yes, where are you going?’ And he says, ‘I want a ticket to nowhere.’ I thought: that’s it. The freedom to do that. I want a ticket to nowhere.

An orchestra can become as familiar and reliable an instrument as a well-known, well-worn piano.

My music had roots which I’d dug up from my own childhood, musical roots buried in the darkest soil.

I cannot play a lie. I have to believe in what I play or it won’t come out.

I always make it a point to pick songs on which players really shine.

I wanted to connect my guitar to human emotions.

If the bass plays the root, a pianist superimposes a Maj7 built on the 5th and the sax plays the 13th, will hot women notice?