Ken Burns

Jazz is a spectacularly accurate model of democracy and a look into our redemptive future possibilities.

Jazz is a very accurate, curiously accurate accompaniment to 20th century America.

By its very nature, no one person can ever be the center of Jazz.

Jazz is something you have to feel, something you have to live.

There are so many sounds I still want to make, so many things I haven’t yet done.

I want a kick to my band, but I don’t want the rhythm to hog the spotlight.

I’m glad I don’t have perfect pitch because it can drive you crazy.

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

I bought my first electric guitar when I moved to Memphis; a Gibson with a DeArmond pickup which I used with a small Gibson amplifier.

It bugs me when people try to analyze Jazz as an intellectual theorem. It’s not, it’s feeling.

There is no truer truth obtainable by man than comes of music.

I didn’t get my music together until I was 40.

Jazz is an art that makes a person completely naked.

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

Don’t worry about playing a lot of notes. Just find one pretty one.

If you think it, want it, dream it… then it’s real. You are what you feel.

Life is 10% what you make it and 90% how you take it.

Once we’re inside a tune, we can do anything with it.