Dave Liebman

Art is constant tension and release. That is where artists live, between the two or at times, submerged in either.

There is nothing new… everything has roots in the past.

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

To the person who uses music as a medium for the expression of ideas, feelings, images, or what have you; anything which facilitates this expression is properly his instrument.

I see my body as an instrument, rather than an ornament.

Jazz isn’t the kind of music you’re going to learn in 3 or 4 years or get because you have talent for music.

Jazz amounts to Blues, your unique sound and the elusive genius of improvisation.

Will the people in the cheaper seats clap your hands? All the rest of you, if you

If I’m not saying it in four choruses or less, then I’m not saying it.

For a long time I wasn’t listening to music, to the rock and roll stuff on the radio, because it would cause me to get sweaty–it would bring back memories I didn’t want to know about, or I would get that feeling that I’m not alive ’cause I’m not making it. And if it was good, I hated it ’cause I wasn’t doing it. And if it was bad, I was furious ’cause I could’ve done it better…

I’ve noticed that the more adventurous and in that mode that I am, it seems that the more the audience really likes it.

Early on, I figured out that when the top of a guitar is vibrating and a string is vibrating, you’ve got a conflict. One of them has got to stop, and it can’t be the string, because that’s making the sound. So in 1934, I asked the Larson Brothers—Chicago instrument makers—to build me a guitar with a half-inch-thick maple top and no f-holes. They thought I was crazy.

Lionel Richie told me forget about the critics. But if you come back with hit after hit, you don’t have to worry about anything.

We’re more popular than Jesus now; I don’t know which will go first, rock ‘n’ roll or Christianity.

I feel that Jazz improvisation is the ultimate. You have to create on the spot, the essence of this music.

As far back as I can remember, singing was in my blood. My parents loved music, and I loved to sing. I was scatting at an early age.

Even if people don’t understand the language that you’re singing in, they still know good music when they hear it.