Tony Bennett

To work is to feel alive.

If you follow your passions, you’ll never work a day in your life.

I still insist that American performers are the best performers in the world.

One of the advantages of growing older is you learn what to leave out.

I never thought Jazz was meant to be a museum piece like other dead things once considered artistic.

I don’t get jazz. It always sounds like a bunch of toddlers let loose in a music room.

Don’t bullshit, just play.

I started playing piano when I was 6. And I knew that wanted to be involved in that form of expression, whether it was through music, or acting, or dancing, or painting, or writing.

‘Swing’ is an adjective or a verb, not a noun. All jazz musicians should swing. There is no such thing as a ‘swing band’ in music.

Miles Davis and John Coltrane were so cool, if alive today global warming wouldn’t be an issue.

If you have something in your life worth celebrating, you can put it in a blues song.

Vocalists must study music and know everything an instrumentalist needs to know.

Musicians have to suffer to a certain degree in order to obtain their outlet.

What have I got? No looks, no money, no education… just talent.

I’m trying to get people to see that we are our brother’s keeper. Red, white, black, brown or yellow, rich or poor, we all have the blues.

I’m creating music – it doesn’t matter if anyone else likes it.

Look at the tune and not make the same statement that has been made a million times.

Don’t play what’s there, play what’s not there.

Your own music comes out of your head and emotions, but it’s not etched in your system.