Duke Ellington

I never had much interest in the piano until I realized that every time I played, a girl would appear on the piano bench to my left and another to my right.

It don’t mean a thing if it ain’t got that swing.

Music, of course, is what I hear and something that I more or less live by. It’s not an occupation or profession, it’s a compulsion.

By and large, jazz has always been like the kind of a man you wouldn’t want your daughter to associate with.

There are two kinds of music. Good music, and the other kind.

The wise musicians are those who play what they can master.

Seeing things that are bothering you written down takes away their power. It gives you a perspective. Helps you contain them.

If you keep your head in the sand, you don’t know where the kick’s coming from.

Greatest thing in life is experience. Even mistakes have value.

You are mine, and that means I am on your side even when no one else is.

Art hath an enemy called Ignorance.

If you hate a person, you hate something in him that is part of yourself. What isn’t part of ourselves doesn’t disturb us.

Its a choice. You just have to decide that I’m not going to put my energy there. I’m going to decide to let this go. It’s your choice. You can embrace it, you can become a prisoner of bitterness and resentment anger and victim city, or you can just say ‘I’m going to live my life and be happy’.

The only normal people are the ones you don’t know very well.

I think you’re running into a lot of trouble if your idea of foreplay is, ‘Brace yourself honey, here I come!’

In theory, there is no difference between theory and practice; In practice, there is.

I have some wonderful friends from the Mideast that are as red, white and blue as anybody you know, that have been harassed, and I think it’s a terrible, terrible thing.

“He who angers you, conquers you.” – Elizabeth Kenny

Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it.

It takes an enemy and a friend, working together, to hurt you to the heart. The one to slander you, and the other to get the news to you.

Every lie is a poison; there are no harmless lies. Only the truth is safe. Only the truth gives me consolation – it is the one unbreakable diamond.