Michel Legrand

It’s not the style that motivates me, as much as an attitude of openness that I have when I go into a project.

Jazz musician is a combination entertainer, poet, singer, educator, student, artist, seducer and all-round good fellow.

There are a million good tunes.

Jazz is an art that makes a person completely naked.

The saxophone is actually a translation of the human voice, in my conception. All you can do is play melody. No matter how complicated it gets, it’s still a melody.

What we hear is the quality of our listening.

They told me to play what I felt. Hey, I’m a Jazz musician, that’s what I do.

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

Talent is only the starting point.

I use the audience as my color palette, my instrument.

I think music needs to be of its time and speak to that time.

One of the advantages of growing older is you learn what to leave out.

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

Musicians have the intimacy of bringing two people together and the aesthetic, romantic transference.

Damn it, when I’m bombastic, I have my reasons. I want to be bombastic: take it or leave it.