Jane Monheit

The hippest thing you can do is not play at all. Just listen.

The thing I always default to is that I’ll always be here to write songs.

I would like to thank my father who discouraged me from playing the violin at an early age.

You will never know what the meaning of Jazz is if ask what it means.

What’s tied Jazz together is its foundation in the Blues, a reliance on group interplay and the unique phenomenon of spontaneous improvisation.

I always wanted to be a spontaneous composer.

I was walking down the street, and I saw a sewer digger on his lunch hour open his lunch pail, dig out a harmonica, knock out the cracker crumbs, and play a bunch of tunes on it. I was fascinated by that harmonica, so I stared the guy out of it. I just stared at him. He said, ‘Here, kid, take it. Get out of here.’

You may be sitting in a room reading this book. Imagine one note struck upon the piano. Immediately that one note is enough to change the atmosphere of the room – proving that the sound element in music is a powerful and mysterious agent, which it would be foolish to deride or belittle.

Jazz has always been a man telling the truth about himself.

You know why I quit playing ballads? Cause I love playing ballads.

You can’t go to the store and buy a good ear and rhythm.

I want the music to connect to people; reach people every time I perform.

I don’t meditate before I play or compose, but I see playing and composing as meditative acts.

Jazz is music made by and for people who have chosen to feel good in spite of conditions.

If jazz has to be termed as a wave, then music is a sea, but if the reflectors in the water is the chord.