Steve Lacy

You have to sound sad first, then maybe later you can sound good.

People don’t want to suffer. They want to sound good immediately and this is one of the biggest problems.

I started in New Orleans music and played all through the history of Jazz.

There’s a lot of recreational Jazz going on, where cats learn a particular style and become sharks on somebody else’s language.

Jazz is like wine. When it is new it’s only for the experts, but when it gets older everybody wants it.

In fifteen seconds the difference between composition and improvisation is that in composition you have all the time you want to decide what to say in fifteen seconds, while in improvisation you have fifteen seconds.

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

External instruments are only extensions of the biological instrument.

If music is sound and came from silence, then silence is potentially greater than sound.

A Jazz musician is a juggler who uses harmonies instead of oranges.

Music is an addiction.

It’s like an act of murder; you play with intent to commit something.

Let me whisper it. Let me sigh it. Let me sing it, my dear or I will cry it.

Three months. I was playing the organ for three months. It was a challenge for me in the beginning.

I wanted to make somebody feel like Coltrane made me feel.

Don’t be a perfectionist… leave that to the classical musicians.

You’ve heard me call myself a bluesman and a blues singer. I call myself a blues singer, but you ain’t never heard me call myself a blues guitar man. Well, that’s because there’s been so many can do it better’n I can, play the blues better’n me. I think a lot of them have told me things, taught me things.

If you can’t play the blues, you might as well hang it up.

Jazz music has always made powerful statements about freedom, creativity and personal identity.

Improvising musicians are musical travelers, voyagers. There is a freedom to wander the musical landscape.

Jazz improvisation is an elusive genius.