Jazz stands for freedom.
Don’t be a perfectionist… leave that to the classical musicians.
It’s like a whole orchestra, the piano for me.
It’s Charlie Parker and Dizzy Gillespie, you know. They got a musical mind together and uh, you can’t explain it.
There is a time where you’re beyond yourself, better than your technique, better than your usual ideas.
You can be beyond yourself, better than your technique, better than most of your usual ideas.
I’m beginning to understand myself. But it would have been great to be able to understand myself when I was 20 rather than when I was 82.
I’m not claiming divinity. I’ve never claimed purity of soul. I’ve never claimed to have the answers to life. I only put out songs and answer questions as honestly as I can… But I still believe in peace, love and understanding.
In Jazz, improvisation isn’t a matter of just making any ol’ thing up. Jazz, like any language, has its own grammer and vocabulary. There’s no right or wrong, just some choices that are better than others.
A guitar is something you can hold and love and it’s never going to bug you. But here’s the secret about the guitar – it’s defiant. It will never let you conquer it. The more you get involved with it, the more you realize how little you know.
There are no natural barriers. It’s all music.
There’s millions and millions of people who think Les Paul is a guitar!
[on Glastonbury] I started off the show and I completely messed up the music. And me, as you can imagine by this phone call, I’m a bit of a perfectionist. So it really put me into a slightly depressed state.
Being a musician is what I do, but it’s not what I am.
I’ve had a lot of things to be proud of in my life, but none more than the Jazz festival.
I don’t do something because I think it’ll sell 30 million albums. I couldn’t care less if it sells just one.
If you like an instrument that sings, play the saxophone. At its best it’s like the human voice
I was unfashionable before anyone knew who I was.
If you already have a piece of music ingrained in your body, why would you not play it?
Love songs last because they are about feelings that don’t change.
You can’t seperate modern jazz from rock or from rhythm and blues – you can’t seperate it. Because that’s where it all started, and that’s where it all come from – that’s where I learned to keep rhythm – in church.
I’m gonna live till I die.
