Art Blakey

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.

Music washes away the dust of every day life.

[On the word Jazz] There’s nothing wrong with it. It’s only a word. What’s in a name? Nothing! Cats say, Call me Muhammed so-and-so. But what’s the difference? A name doesn’t make the music. It’s just called that to differentiate it from other types of music. Jazz is known all over the world as an American musical art form and that’s it. No America, no jazz. I’ve seen people try to connect it to other countries, for instance to Africa, but it doesn’t have a damn thing to do with Africa.

When it comes to music, don’t lie to yourself; just tell yourself the truth.

It takes an intelligent ear to listen to Jazz.

A name doesn’t make the music. It’s just called that to differentiate it from other types of music.

I discovered very early that it wasn’t quite enough for me to imitate people.

Being a Jazz musician is not a rose garden!

If you don’t make mistakes, you aren’t really trying.

They’re not particular whether you’re playing a flat 5th or a ruptured 129th as long as they can dance.

Jazz is a feeling more than anything else.

Always be a first-rate version of yourself, instead of a second-rate version of someone else.

I think you can play anything you wanna as long as you take the audience along with you.

When it comes to music, don’t lie to yourself; just tell yourself the truth.

If I have to go around telling everyone how great I am, then there’s something wrong with my act.

There’s a way of playing safe and then there’s where you create something you haven’t created before.

Jimmy (Wakely) told me, ‘I don’t want you to sound so much like Dinah Washington.’ So, I thought, ‘How can I get around this?’ And one of the people I really dug was Patti Page. So I thought, ‘Oh, I’m going to sound like her.’ I actually did with a couple curly-cues thrown in for effect, but, that’s how I started getting away from the predominant Dinah influence, and getting my own style together.

Have you ever wondered why young people take to music like fish to water? Maybe it’s because music is fun, plain and simple.

I can’t understand these guys who just have to have your autograph. I asked one of them ‘What do you do when you get home, take it out and look at it?’

What I learned the most from Prince was putting art first, being creatively ambitious, and putting creativity at the forefront of what I do.

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