Oscar Peterson

You not only have to know your own instrument, you must know the others and how to back them up at all times. That’s jazz.

Some players get very philosophical and cerebral about Jazz. You don’t need any prologues, you just play.

I don’t do something because I think it will sell 30 million albums. I couldn’t care less. If it sells one, it sells one.

I don’t do something because I think it’ll sell 30 million albums. I couldn’t care less if it sells just one.

Some people try to get very philosophical and cerebral about what they’re trying to say with jazz. You don’t need any prologues, you just play. If you have something to say of any worth then people will listen to you.

If you have something to say of any worth then people will listen to you.

I was not prepared to play the role of singer in the camp of the warriors

Breathe…. breathe a lot!

Blues purists never cared for me. I don’t worry about it. I think if it this way: When I made ‘Three O’ Clock Blues,’ they were not there. The people out there made the tune. And blues purists just wrote about it. The people is who I’m trying to satisfy.

If T-Bone Walker had been a woman, I would have asked him to marry me. I’d never heard anything like that before: single-string blues played on an electric guitar.

I think I love it more as I get older because I keep getting better on drums, vibes and piano.

Jazz is very much alive. Everywhere I go there’s a new generation of musicians playing Jazz music.

I say this because it’s a good message to give to young talents who feel as I used to. You hear musicians playing with great fluidity and complete conception early on, and you don’t have that ability. I didn’t. I had to know what I was doing. And ultimately it turned out that these people weren’t able to carry their thing very far. I found myself being more attracted to artists who have developed through the years and become better and deeper musicians.I believe in things that are developed through hard work.

Jazz Improvisation means that practice is not as straightforward as it would be when you simply have a score to play.

I’m not like a legend that – so I’m sort of in the middle in this sort of gray area where, you know, I’m creating music, and I’m not saying there isn’t an audience, because there is; because all of those people go out and spend $80 to $150 on a concert ticket.

One very important thing I learned from Monk was his complete dedication to music.

I don’t need words. It’s all in the phrasing.

I hear beauty and elegance combined with passion and fire.

Playing ‘bop’ is like playing Scrabble with all the vowels missing.

The people who know nothing about music are the ones always talking about it.

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