Music is an addiction.
Music and life are all about style.
You know why I quit playing ballads? Cause I love playing ballads.
Jazz is the big brother of Revolution. Revolution follows it around.
I’ll play it first and tell you what it is later.
For me, music and life are all about style
Don’t play what’s there, play what’s not there.
Music is the mediator between the spiritual and the sensual life.
I went through a struggle, and I really needed to get myself together and connect with my purpose, which is music.
To me, the guitar cuts through. It carries more than the organ, but the organ has got more guts.
The more vulnerable and the more confused the song is, the equal and opposite effect is how I feel after having written it.
If I’m going to sing like someone else, then I don’t need to sing at all.
I believe in using the entire piano as a single instrument capable of expressing every possible musical idea.
Get around, be on the scene, play it clean, be seen, be keen and be over eighteen.
I bought my first electric guitar when I moved to Memphis; a Gibson with a DeArmond pickup which I used with a small Gibson amplifier.
Anyone who doesn’t give [his debut album, The College Dropout] a perfect score is lowering the integrity of the magazine
Vocalists must study music and know everything an instrumentalist needs to know.
Music is my life, professionally, for nearly 60 years. To be recognized by the academy is still the highest honor.
One very important thing I learned from Monk was his complete dedication to music. That was his reason for being alive. Nothing else mattered except music, really.
I decided that I would be one of the biggest new names; and I actually had some little fancy business cards printed up to announce it, ‘Count Basie. Beware, the Count is Here.
In order to complete your cycle, a musician needs to write; document what is going through your mind and where you are harmonically, theoretically, historically.
If you have something to say of any worth then people will listen to you.
