George Benson

I’ve had the pleasure of playing with the baddest Jazz cats on the planet.

People love us when we play what we want to play but we’re starving.

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.

There’s always room for improvisation or changes of expression.

Man, you tell a story.

[On Louis Armstrong] You can’t play nothing on modern trumpet that doesn’t come from him, not even modern shit. I can’t even remember a time when he sounded bad playing the trumpet. Never. Not even one time. He had great feeling up in his playing and he always played on the beat. I just loved the way he played and sang.

When I began listening to saxophones, I was first attracted to Coleman Hawkins.

I still insist that American performers are the best performers in the world.

I have a nice car, a Mercedes. And then I have an old El Camino truck that I’m crazy about. I like to get in that truck and go up in the hills near where I live, in Vegas, and take my camera. That, to me, is Heaven, being out in nature, taking pictures of the wildlife.

I think that what is important is that the music be honest and direct and that it is relevant to today.

One chord is fine. Two chords are pushing it. Three chords and you’re into jazz.

If a literary man puts together two words about music, one of them will be wrong.

Creativity shouldn’t be following radio; it should be the other way around.

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

I always wanted to be a spontaneous composer.

Why Jazz? This is just the way I see music.

Tomorrow you’ll wish you had practiced harder today.