Mary Lou Williams

For most dates I was paid the sum of $1 per hr and they always tipped me at the end of the night.

Many people forget that Jazz, no matter what form it takes, must come from the heart as well as the mind.

I’m no good with chords. I’m horrible with chords.

There has always been a tension between Jazz as a commercial music and as an art form.

Nothing is so well-prepared as a great spontaneous performance.

By and large Jazz has always been like the kind of a man you wouldn’t want your daughter to associate with.

I play as I feel.

The day of the great jazz improviser who doesn’t know how to read music is over.

I know what I’ve done for music, but don’t call me a legend. Just call me Miles Davis.

I like the music. I love it and live it in fact, but for me the business part just plain stinks.

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

For me, I started on a Les Paul and went through years of playing other guitars and just came back full circle to what was more natural to me.

They’re singing your praises while stealing your phrases.

Most people use music as a couch; they want to be pillowed on it, relaxed and consoled for the stress of daily living. But serious music was never meant to be soporific.

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

If you really understand the meaning of be-bop, you understand the meaning of freedom.

I developed in my head that I’m never any better than my last concert or the last time I played, so it’s like an audition each time. You get nervous just before going onstage. I still have that, but I think it’s more like concern. You’re concerned about the people – like meeting your in-laws for the first time.