Eric Reed

I was a singing disc jockey who heard every type of music there was – and loved it all.

I don’t know where Jazz is going. Maybe it’s going to hell. You can’t make anything go anywhere. It just happens.

I like people who have worked long and hard, developing through introspection and dedication.

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.

Knowledge speaks, wisdom listens.

Any particular style of playing which represents an authentic way of musical feeling is genuine expression.

Every day when I sit down to play, I learn something new.

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

All that I’ve played, all that I’ve sung, I couldn’t have done any other way.

Man, if you gotta ask you’ll never know.

Jazz is a beautiful word. I love it.

The trio is the biggest sound you can have with the smallest unit.

A band ought to have a sound all of its own. It ought to have a personality.

I’ve found you’ve got to look back at the old things and see them in a new light.

The whole thing of being in music is not to control it but to be swept away by it.