Lee Konitz

Sound is the first thing that we tune into.

Most jazz players work out their solos, at least to the extent that they have a very specific vocabulary.

Benny Goodman was one of the big influences as a clarinet player. That’s why I wanted the clarinet.

I’d like to feel that whatever I play is a result of whatever I’ve heard.

If you can’t play the blues, you might as well hang it up.

There are so many sounds I still want to make, so many things I haven’t yet done.

I wanted to sustain a note like a singer. I wanted to phrase a note like a saxist. By bending the strings, by trilling my hand – and I have big fat hands – I could achieve something that approximated a vocal vibrato. I could sustain a note. I wanted to connect my guitar to human emotions. By fooling with the feedback between my amplifier and instrument, I started experimenting with sounds that expressed my feelings, whether happy or sad, bouncy or bluesy. I was looking for ways to let my guitar sing.

I think when my brother (Claude who founded vocal sextet Take Six) got his deal and I saw him on the Grammys that was when I said, ‘oh, you know what? If he can do it then maybe I can do too’ and that’s when I really focused on trying to make it in this business.

I like to know for whom I’m writing – it makes the composition easier to do.

Let my children have music.

Play for the spiritual aspect, the emotion.

Jazz is there and gone. It happens. You have to be present for it. That simple.

There’s so many ways you can hit one note.

Music represents nature. Nature represents life. Jazz represents nature. Jazz is life.

[In 1972] At the moment, we’re getting the same thrill from seeing the Eagles, Jackson Browne, Jo Jo Gunne, and Judee Sill happen… It’s as hard to do it with Jackson Browne as it was to do it with Joni five years ago.

To rise above the crowd, discipline yourself unceasingly to the strict demand and realities of your ambition.

Inspiration grows into full-scale creation through persistence and imagination.

Music is a calling that you must bring your best to, whether listening, practicing or performing.

I can tell whether a person can play just by the way he stands …If they act too hip, you know they can’t play shit.