Risk is at the heart of Jazz. Every note we play is a risk.
We’re here to have a ball.
Jazz music is a style, not compositions; any kind of music may be played in Jazz if one has the knowledge.
If the audience doesn’t hear what is going on, is it going on?
Miles Davis is one who writes songs when he plays.
Jazz is a work in progress. We’ll be defining traditions in Jazz for 200-300 years.
I find my inspiration in myself.
I merely took the energy it takes to pout and wrote some blues.
It is Jazz’s very nature to change, to develop and adapt to the circumstances of its environment.
Just allow your feelings to go with the music and you’ll find yourself carried along by it fairly quickly.
Mary Lou Williams used to tell me: If you’re not feeling right, play a minor tune and it falls into place.
Jazz is the big brother of Revolution. Revolution follows it around.
Nobody has ever been able to define Jazz satisfactorily. This is probably because anyone who was capable of doing so never really wanted to, knowing how much you would have to leave out of the definition.
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.
If your dreams don’t scare you they’re not big enough!
If you have to ask what jazz is, you’ll never know.
Jazz is a white term to define black people. My music is black classical music.
I was never interested in singing in the church or school. I was more interested in becoming a musician.
If you feel like tapping your feet, tap your feet.
Jazz attracted me because in it I found a formal perfection and instrumental precision that I admire in classical music, but which popular music doesn’t have.
The reason I write music is that I feel it’s a vehicle or channel which leads to your true self, your essence.
