Freddie Hubbard

They always want to sell me as a hard bopper.

Dizzy used to tell me I’m playing too hard. He’d say to not give everything. Miles told me that too.

If my own work had more importance than any others, it’s because the piano is the key instrument in music.

If you take the time and your talent is real, it will last.

Composing makes me feel like I’ve finally gotten all the way up the ladder as a musician.

Whatever else has been said about me personally is unimportant. When I sing, I believe I’m honest.

I used to play – when I first started trying to be professional, I disk jockey from 1949 to 1955 in Memphis, Tennessee, and I was quite popular there as a disk jockey.

In our local Baptist church, I sang in the choir and formed a gospel quartet. When our minister caught me messing with his guitar, he taught me three positions – one, four and five. After that, I taught myself to play.

Jazz Improvisation means that practice is not as straightforward as it would be when you simply have a score to play.

I thought Eric Clapton was good. He still is. Not only is he good – he’s rock’s #1 guitarist, and he plays blues better than most of us.

If the bass plays the root, a pianist superimposes a Maj7 built on the 5th and the sax plays the 13th, will hot women notice?

When you make a sound, it carries on to infinity. Sound is a vibration. Vibration is energy. All of that survives in space long after we’re dead. When I walk on stage at the Wiener Staatsoper, I can feel the footsteps of Chopin and Rachmaninov.

I was first awakened to musical exploration by Dizzy and Bird.

I hate to think of Jazz as black and white, something political.

I love to hear the note sing.

Music has to be accessible.

[moving to Las Vegas] It was sort of like a man getting married – you don’t have to go out looking for girls, you’ve got your girl with you. I could go to casinos any time I had money and wanted to, so I actually went less.