Terri Lyne Carrington

Jazz means many things to many people, but it’s all about choices.

Our music artistry should not be disconnected from our lives or ourselves.

Once you have been bitten by the Jazz bug, it is not a choice anymore.

Women have not been socialized to play drums. It’s not natural for us to hit thing.

Everything I’ve ever done was out of fear of being mediocre.

I only knew classical music, which to me was the only true music. The only way I could survive at the bar was to mix the classical music with popular songs, and that meant I had to sing. What happened was that I discovered I had a voice plus the talent to mix classical music together with more popular songs, which at the time I detested.

I always make it a point to pick songs on which players really shine.

Eliminating the piano means that I’ve always worked closer with the bass than most players.

I used to play – when I first started trying to be professional, I disk jockey from 1949 to 1955 in Memphis, Tennessee, and I was quite popular there as a disk jockey.

I don’t think anybody steals anything; all of us borrow.

Jazz is not just music, it’s a way of life, it’s a way of being, a way of thinking… The new inventive phrases we make up to describe things – all that to me is jazz just as much as the music we play.

Jazz is an art that makes a person completely naked.

Jazz is not dead, it just smells funny.

I don’t meditate before I play or compose, but I see playing and composing as meditative acts.

If you take the time and your talent is real, it will last.

I just remember always trying to emulate Dinah Washington, hanging out in my bedroom closet.

[on Django Reinhardt] This was a man who changed my musical life by giving me a whole new perspective on the guitar and, on an even more profound level, on my relationship with sound…During my formative years, as I listened to Django’s records, especially songs like ‘Nuages’ that I would play for the rest of my life, I studied his technique. Even more, I studied his gentleness. I love the human sound he gave his acoustic guitar.

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.

It’s easier to copy someone else than to find out how to avoid sounding like someone else.