Yogi Berra

No one goes there nowadays, it’s too crowded.

A nickel ain’t worth a dime anymore.

For me, the most important thing is the element of chance that is built into a live performance. The very great drawback of recorded sound is the fact that it is always the same. No matter how wonderful a recording is, I know that I couldn’t live with it–even of my own music–with the same nuances forever.

I don’t care much about music. What I like is sounds.

I guess you can look at me, and tell I’m the old man. My name is BB King.

Jazz has the ability to absorb and transform influences from diverse musical styles.

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

Jazz is the assassination, the murdering, the slaying of syncopation. I would even go so far as to confess that we are musical anarchists.

Technique is the ability to translate your ideas into sound through your instrument.

Music is an extraordinary vehicle for expressing very powerful emotions. That’s what draws people towards it.

To work is to feel alive.

I think of guitar players in terms of doctors: you have the doctor for your heart, the cardiologist, then one that works on your feet, your leg. But I believe George Benson is the one that plays all over. To me, he would be the M.D. of them all.

There’s always this sound out there that’s just a little beyond my reach and that just sort of keeps me going.

Music is the only language in which you cannot say anything sarcastic.

We usually never got out of there before four or five o’clock in the morning. Every morning. So it was rough.

It’s not what you do, but the way you’re doing it and in the end that’s all that we have.

By giving the public a rich and full melody, distinctly arranged and well played, all the time creating new tone colors and patterns, I feel we have a better chance of being successful. I want a kick to my band, but I don’t want the rhythm to hog the spotlight.