Jimmy Rushing

The blues comes right back to a person’s feelings, to his daily activities in life. But rich people don’t know nothing about the blues, please believe me.

My dark sound could be heard across a room clearer than somebody with a reedy sound. It had more projection. My sound always seemed to fill a room.

I don’t get jazz. It always sounds like a bunch of toddlers let loose in a music room.

It’s easy to play any musical instrument, just touch the right key at the right time and the instrument will play itself.

T-Bone was, to me, that sound of being in heaven.

When you begin to teach Jazz, the most dangerous thing is to teach style.

I gave it my absolute everything I had in that howl at the start of the song. And then B. B. King opened up his mouth and I felt like a girl. We had learned and absorbed, but the more we tried to be like B.B., the less convincing we were.

I do the best I can with any instrument I get attracted to. But they’re just tools in order for you to express yourself and that’s really the upshot of it.

It takes an intelligent ear to listen to Jazz.

There’s only one bass player in a band. I’m the best bass player of any band I’m in.

My singing evolved with a feeling of intense relaxation, always using my diaphram and breathing specifically through my nose.

If you like an instrument that sings, play the saxophone. At its best it’s like the human voice

Jazz is not gonna be a dinosaur and stay around in one form.

We in the Western world suffer from too many categories and classes; we’ve forgotten that we all still have diapers on. We’ve separated music from life.

Jazz is the big brother of Revolution. Revolution follows it around.

We all do ‘do, re, mi’ but you got to find the other notes yourself.