John Mayall

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.

Working with people, the musical part is one thing but the personal part is totally different and just as critical. If the friendship is there and it’s a lasting friendship, then it will take care of itself.

I keep healthy and I’m always very active and always have been so. I don’t really see any signs of aging yet. Music keeps you young.

The way I look at it, they’re all part of my musical diary, and I can listen to any one of them and it will bring up memories of what was going on at that time.

When I write songs that touch on social relevance, all you have to do is pick up a newspaper.

I write songs about real things… The subject dictates the mood and it goes from there, really.

It was in tune when I bought it.

Music gives us a lot of things and it only wants one thing back… your attention.

It isn’t where you came from, its where you’re going that counts.

I’ve been a jazz artist playing pop and R&B my entire career.

We’re not like pop musicians who have to perform the same top ten tunes every night of a tour.

Jazz music is the power of now.

The melody is generally what the piece is all about.

I always had a deep feeling to be one with the very minute I’m in.

I don’t consider myself a musician who has achieved perfection and can’t develop any further.

When I got started in New York, if you were different from Miles and Dizzy it was very difficult.

A musician’s responsibility is to get as much of his art across to the public as possible.

If you’ve only got one horn playing, I still want the sense of ensemble.

Musicians need to continue higher learning try to expand the pallet.

I really feel like I made it a great record. I really feel good about it. In this day and age to make a record that you say, ‘This is different,’ that’s a tough nut. I did it by accident but it got done. I don’t know what I’m doing, but I know how to do it.

Hell, nobody knows where jazz is going to go. There may be a kid right now in Chitlin Switch, Georgia, who is going to come along and upset everybody.