Ellen Johnson

I love Jazz because it has the perfect balance of discipline and freedom.

I remember Glenn Miller coming to me once, before he had his own band, saying, How do you do it? How do you get started? It’s so difficult. I told him, I don’t know but whatever you do don’t stop. Just keep on going.

A Les Paul, which is kind of a sissy guitar compared to a Strat anyway. The Les Paul is heavier, but because of that bulk you can do bends on it more easily. Also, the Les Paul’s lack of a vibrato arm means you’re not wrestling against the spring-loaded bridge all the time. The Strat is the ultimate because it’s like having a miniature pedal steel within it. Once you get familiar with it where the bends are and where they meld down into a fourth or whatever, you can do all kinds of pedal-steel-like things, which I think are cool..

I hate straight singing. I have to change a tune to my own way of doing it. That’s all I know

If I were to call it black music, that would be untrue. I don’t know what that is, unless it would be some African drums or something.

If I could sell 500 million records every time, it would be great. But I’ve also had the luxury experience of having it when I was a teenager, in a very kind of model version of it.

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

I’m always interested in looking forward toward the future. Carving out new ways of looking at things.

You have to understand the styles and it’s good to study those that came before us.

There’s such a cynicism about the phrase ‘I laughed all the way to the bank.’ It’s as though money is what you’re doing, rather than playing music. If you’re playing a money game, why not get into banking?

Anything I do has to be directly related to my music. If it isn’t, I don’t really see a point to it.

Montreal was a very active jazz center until club owners started putting in strippers instead of music. Before long, there was nothing to hear.

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

I love to hear the note sing.

Women bring something different to an instrument if they are respectful of their feminine aesthetic.

Count don’t do nothin’. But it sure sounds good.