My music is Jazz.
External instruments are only extensions of the biological instrument.
There’s a lot of recreational Jazz going on, where cats learn a particular style and become sharks on somebody else’s language.
Man, as long as people want to hear Jazz, I’ll give it to them.
Always look ahead, but never look back.
You blows who you is.
Jazz has such great feeling and emotional content it really doesn’t require technical understanding.
People don’t want to suffer. They want to sound good immediately and this is one of the biggest problems.
Talent is cheap, and many talents treat themselves cheaply.
I liked blues from the time my mother used to take me to church. I started to listen to gospel music, so I liked that. But I had an aunt at that time, my mother’s aunt who bought records by people like Lonnie Johnson, Robert Johnson, Blind Lemon Jefferson, and a few others.
It was a great thrill to listen every night and hear him on NBC radio. Les played just as great then. And then later on, in the 1950s, Les Paul turned the whole world on to guitar. He’s just a terrific, flashy, tasty guitarist.
Anyone who understands Jazz knows that you can’t understand it. It’s too complicated. That’s what’s so simple about it.
[on B. B. King] Very seldom does he talks about the way he play, man. He always wanna talk about young women. And I fuss at him sometimes, I say, Man I wanna know what did you do here!’
I wasn’t interested in practicing Bach; I was too busy digging Horace Silver!
Its the group sound thats important, even when youre playing a solo. You not only have to know your own instrument, you must know the others and how to back them up at all times. Thats jazz.
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.
The more you play, the more you hear and the more you hear, the more you want to play.
