Best musician & jazz Quotes | Short & Famous Sayings Page 2

“To say that the Afro American created jazz doesn't mean anything bad about Anglo Americans, and I always teach my younger jazz musicians that at this point the entirety of the American tradition is your heritage, and you need to know it.”

Knows Needs Mean Teach Musician Tradition Jazz Heritage Jazz Music Jazz Musician Entirety Afros American Tradition

Author:Wynton Marsalis

“When I did the Abyssinian mass, I went through the whole history of the church music and the gospel music, even with the Anglo American hymns, the Afro American hymns, the spirituals and how it developed, up to Thomas Dorsey and the Dixie Hummingbirds, going through the history of the music, jazz musicians.”

Whole Church Musician Mass Jazz Jazz Music Hymns Jazz Musician Afros Hummingbirds Gospel Music Dixie Church Music

Author:Wynton Marsalis

“One of the most obvious aspects of the music to people who know jazz is: How does it feel in the swing? These are things that are very subtle and that jazz musician appreciate in a particular way. I appreciate the way Tommy Flanagan swings, the way that Barry Harris swings, the great pulse that Hank Jones and Bill Evans have - end every one of them is different.”

People Knows Way Feels Doe Different Ends Particular Musician Aspect Appreciate Bills Jazz Obvious Subtle Swings Pulse Jazz Music Jazz Musician

Author:Chuck Israels

“I have always loved jazz music and as a teen growing up in New York City and then later on as an adult have great memories of the jazz clubs that were all located on 52nd Street. I still catch as many jazz shows as I can when I am in New York. And when I perform, I have my jazz quartet by my side. Jazz musicians keep things spontaneous and very "live," which is the way I like to perform.”

Way Stills I Can Shows Sides Memories Cities Growing Up Growing Streets New York Musician Adults Jazz Clubs New York City Spontaneous Jazz Music Jazz Musician Quartets Great Memories

Author:Tony Bennett

“There's been this perception that Europeans still hold on to, that they discover the real talented ones in American culture and give them proper credit and that's not true anymore - it used to be. A lot of jazz musicians would get respect in Europe.”

Giving Stills Real Used Culture Perception Musician Europe Jazz Credit Used To Be American Culture Jazz Music Jazz Musician

Author:Andrew Bird

“Armstrong was the key creator of the mature working language of jazz. Three decades after his death and more than three-quarters of a century since his influence first began to spread, not a single musician who has mastered that language fails to make daily use, knowingly or unknowingly, of something that was invented by Louis Armstrong.”

Firsts Use Three Language Failing Influence Century Keys Musician Jazz Creator Spread Decades Mature Quarters Armstrong Quarter Of A Century

Author:Dan Morgenstern

“Jazz musicians are the coolest people on the planet. Can I have some cool?”

People Planets Musician Jazz Jazz Music Jazz Musician

Author:Jon Stewart

“I'm a jazz musician by education and vocation, but I don't think jazz should [ dictate] what I want to do.”

Thinking Want Should Musician Jazz Vocation Jazz Music Jazz Musician

Author:Dave Douglas

“From the small clubs of the Harlem Renaissance where he began playing saxophone to world tours for the biggest of the big bands, Benny Carter redefined American jazz. From the start, his fellow musicians said the way he played the sax was amazing. They say that about me, too. (Laughter.) But I don't think they mean it in quite the same way.”

Thinking World Way Mean Said Bigs Band Musician Laughter Fellows Jazz Clubs Renaissance Carter Saxophone Harlem Harlem Renaissance

Author:William J. Clinton

“I met Gary (Burton) at the Wichita Jazz Festival when I was 18 -- he was one of my favorite musicians and I got to play a few tunes with him there. Shortly after that, I joined his band, which was the equivalent of joining the Beatles for me! He was, and still is, one of the greatest musicians I have ever been lucky enough to be around.”

Stills Enough Play Mets Lucky Band Musician Jazz My Favorite Tunes Festivals Joining Gary Greatest Musician

Author:Pat Metheny

“I always say that you should just listen to it and see what you think it sounds like it is. I don't think it should be labeled. Most musicians feel like that. No one wants to put their music in a category. But, I don't think it's all over the place. I don't go from metal to jazz, or anything crazy.”

Thinking Want Feels Should Sound Crazy Musician Jazz Categories Metals Just Listen

Author:Tinsel Korey

“Of course we've lost so many superstars who've made jazz what it is. We've lost so many musicians who created new things and changed the way we think about music and who took jazz to a new level. So jazz is suffering from that. But we still have a lot of incredible people playing jazz in the world. We have a lot of people leading the way.”

“He's not a performer, he's not a composer, he's not even a musician, but Norman Granz is Mr. Jazz.”

Musician Jazz Performers Composer

Author:Oscar Peterson

“He [Benny Carter] is all that every jazz musician the world over wants to be. He's performed 20,000 nights. How many shoes have been shined? How much mascara put on? Rouge? How many of those impossible bowties have been tied? How many love songs have been sung? How many dances have been danced? How many have passed to the sound of his music? It's been said that a man should not be forced to live up to his art. Benny Carter is one of the rare instances when we wonder whether the great art that a man has created can live up to him.”

Men World Want Should Has Beens Art Said Night Song Sound Wonder Impossible Musician Art Is Jazz Shoes Instance Tied Great Art Jazz Music Carter Jazz Musician Mascara Rouge

Author:Wynton Marsalis

“It's easy to play any musical instrument: all you have to do is touch the right key at the right time and the instrument will play itself.”

“Comedy is the drug, when they laugh it's like I'm a jazz musician and they hear it, and they get it. It's power to take the crowd wherever I want them to go. I love it when they laugh, especially when they relate through laughter. It's a beautiful thing. It also means I'm going to get paid, which is nice.”

Want Mean Beautiful Laughing Comedy Nice Drug Musician Laughter Paid Jazz Crowds Relate Beautiful Things Jazz Music Jazz Musician

Author:Alonzo Bodden

“I'm not a jazz musician, because, I mean, firstly, I can't play anything. I'm not bad on the tamborine. I have a certain way with the triangle. But I'm not a jazz musician ... my band, they always joke, they always say that I'm a disposable, pop, jazz superstar.”

Way Mean I Can Play Certain Band Musician Jokes Jazz Pops Jazz Music Superstar Jazz Musician Disposable Triangles

Author:Michael Buble

“I go down to New York, do the project, and leave. I have no interest in participating in the rat race down there. Hip jazz fans know who I am. There's a generation of musicians in New York who know my records better than I do.”

Knows Interest Race Records Generations Fans New York Fame Projects Musician Jazz Who I Am Hips Rats Participating Rat Race

Author:Paul Smoker

“I don't really have a career as a jazz musician. I don't really have a career as a classical musician. I don't really have a career as a college professor, and yet I did all those things and I did them well. I put out some records in the 1980's and 1990's that changed the way some trumpet players played.”

Way Wells Careers Records Player Changed College Musician Jazz Professors Classical Music Jazz Music Trumpets Jazz Musician Classical Musicians College Professors

Author:Paul Smoker

“She [Joni Mitchell] wanted to have that (jazz) element in her music. Of course, when she heard Jaco's [Jaco Pastorius'] music and met him, that floored her -- really grabbed her. She decided that Wayne Shorter was really conducive to her music. She would speak metaphorically about things. "I want this to sound like a taxicab driver, or a taxi in New York," or "I want this to sound like a telephone ringing." She would speak to musicians like that, and we really tuned into what she would want our music to be.”

Want Wanted Courses Speak Sound Heard New York Mets Elements Musician Decided Jazz Drivers Telephones Taxi Wayne

Author:Don Alias

“To date, [Wynton] Marsalis has received a total of nine Grammy Awards; a Pulitzer Prize (the first ever awarded to a jazz musician)... and twenty-nine honorary degrees, including Columbia, Brown, Princeton and Yale; the National Medal of Arts; and numerous awards from other countries.”

Source: Where the dark and the light folks meet: race and the mythology, politics, and business of jazz

“I like musicians who look at the public. You have to bring the music to the largest number. Otherwise, we'll [the Jazz players] stay in the clubs. Jazz must be accessible to everyone.”

Looks Numbers Player Musician Jazz Clubs

Author:Dee Dee Bridgewater

“When I'm working behind a camera, I feel like I'm trying to achieve something like a jazz musician does.”

Feels Trying Doe Behinds Achieve Musician Cameras Jazz Jazz Music Jazz Musician

Author:Jack Welpott

“I always tell my students when you're going to be a jazz musician the first thing you've got to do is be a professional musician, and that means you have to feed yourself with the instrument.”

Firsts Mean Students Musician Instruments Jazz Jazz Music Jazz Musician

Author:Lester Bowie

“I started to listen to Japanese jazz musicians when I went to high school. Some people I listened to were Yosuke Yamashita, Toshiko Akiyoshi, Sadao Watanabe.”

People School Musician High School Jazz Jazz Music Jazz Musician

Author:Hiromi

“I have a theory that musicians recognize each other and if they are destined to collaborate together they will. Mainly, they recognize each other according to the class they belong to. If they are punk-rocker kids from the neighborhood, they are going form a band. If they happen to be musicians that are going to play in pubs and restaurants, they are going to recognize each other, form a band and play together. If it's about musicians that are playing jazz and are going to jazz festivals, for e.g., then they are going to meet and work together.”

Ifs Play Happens Kids Together Form Class Theory Band Musician Jazz Restaurants Neighborhood Working Together Punk Destined Festivals Pubs Rockers Playing Jazz

Author:Vlatko Stefanovski

“Recording in Nashville was absolutely essential to get the sound, the musicians, the atmosphere, the warmth... There are just cult places like that in the world, like Chicago for the blues or New York for jazz. Nothing sounds the same in Nashville as it does elsewhere. Nashville is the Mecca of country music and everyone knows it.”

Knows World Doe Country Sound New York Essentials Musician Jazz Atmosphere Warmth Chicago Elsewhere Cult Nashville Mecca

Author:Roch Voisine

“Jazz is the greatest American art form and our greatest export. We don't pay attention to the youth of jazz, don't stoke the fires creatively for the youth coming up. I feel like jazz musicians became too much of purists - with Donald Byrd doing funk jazz in the '70s.”

Feels Art Form Pay Attention Fire Too Much Youth Musician Jazz Pay Attention Jazz Music Jazz Musician Funk Stoke

Author:Talib Kweli

“I started singing Folksongs with my mother when I was 6 years old. We sang at Folk festivals and concerts and schools. There was always music being played either on record, Jazz and Folk, by musician friends of my mother. I took to singing very early, I believe it has been a Gift I was born with.”

Years Believe Has Beens School Mother I Believe Born Records Musician Music Is Singing Jazz Folks Concerts Festivals Being Played

Author:Vicki Sue Robinson

“Jazz is the music of the body. The breath comes through brass. It is the body's breath, and the strings' wails and moans are echoes of the body's music. It is the body's vibrations which ripple from the fingers. And the mystery of the withheld theme, known to jazz musicians alone, is like the mystery of our secret life. We give to others only peripheral improvisations.”

Giving Body Secret Known Mystery Musician Breaths Jazz Fingers Theme Strings Echoes Vibrations Jazz Music Improvisation Ripple Secret Life Brass Jazz Musician

Author:Anais Nin

“I knew I could never be accepted as a straight-ahead jazz musician, nor would Iaccept myself as that. I would never be accepted as a minimalist. I wouldn't be adowntown composer. Because I find all orthodoxies, all doctrines to be ultimatelybanal.”

Musician Jazz Accepted Doctrine Composer Jazz Music Orthodoxy Jazz Musician Minimalist

Author:Anthony Davis

“Most of the musicians that I'm playing with now have jazz backgrounds, so they're comfortable with improvisation. And they all know to make eye contact with me, and I'll give them some kind of sign when I think that the song's ending. Or maybe I don't even have to, because they all sort of feel it at the same time.”

Thinking Knows Giving Feels Kind Eye Song Comfortable Musician Jazz Backgrounds Contact Improvisation Eye Contact

Author:Larkin Grimm

“I actually wanted to be a jazz musician first. My grandparents introduced me to Louis Armstrong. I loved Louis Armstrong so I took up the trumpet and just did that every day and practiced that.”

Firsts Wanted Musician Jazz Grandparent Jazz Music Trumpets Jazz Musician Armstrong

Author:Douglas Booth

“I fear that I won't get better and that I won't have time to practice. To be called a "jazz musician" - it's a big responsibility.”

Bigs Responsibility Practice Musician Jazz Get Better Jazz Music Jazz Musician Big Responsibility

Author:Esperanza Spalding

“I was deeply influenced by the sartorial practices of both preachers and jazz musicians and actually Masha in Act One of Anton Chekhov, my favorite writer's master piece,Three Sisters,when she arrives reflecting on whether they're ever going to get to Moscow, memories of the death of their father, and she's in black, and she says I'm in mourning for the world, saying in part that I have a sad soul and a cheerful disposition.”

“If you truly have expertise - and expertise can be say a chess master who has really mastered something or an artist or a musician of some sort you know if you give a jazz musician.”

Ifs Knows Giving Artist Masters Musician Jazz Chess Jazz Music Expertise Jazz Musician

Author:Sheena Iyengar

“Once the jazz musician learns all the fundamentals they can keep track of a lot of choices in an instant.”

Choices Musician Fundamentals Jazz Track Instant Jazz Music Jazz Musician

Author:Sheena Iyengar

“A lot of the people that I photograph are master musicians themselves, whether they're singers or great jazz players and it's kind of fun to figure out who they came up with and who they emulated or who they idolized actually.”

People Kind Fun Player Figures Masters Musician Jazz Photograph Singers Idolized

Author:Carol Friedman

“Many of the jazz musicians whom are no longer here. You don't realize that it's history when it is happening and then time passes and you look at a picture and you say "Wow, there is history attached to that."”

Looks Realizing Musician Happenings Jazz Wow Jazz Music Time Passes Jazz Musician

Author:Carol Friedman

“As any jazz musician knows, it takes flexibility and adaptability for improvisation to create beauty.”

Knows Beauty Musician Jazz Flexibility Jazz Music Improvisation Adaptability Jazz Musician

Book:From Chaos to Coherence: The Power to Change Performance

Source: From Chaos to Coherence: The Power to Change Performance

“Europe was a very contentious subject in literature and yet jazz musicians still depended on Europe. Now it's not such a big deal.”

Stills Bigs Literature Deals Subjects Musician Europe Jazz Big Deal Jazz Music Jazz Musician Contentious

Author:Darryl Pinckney

“I play classical music almost exclusively. I never mastered jazz or gospel in the way that my mother did. She was a fine improvisational musician. I pretty much have to stick to what's written on the page.”

Way Play Mother Written Fine Musician Pages Sticks Jazz Classical Music

Author:Condoleezza Rice

“Then it evolved into more of a ballad style singer/songwriter thing. And there was a conflict in trying to merge the two styles with the same band behind me. 'Cause the musicians that I would need to do ballad-oriented tunes would require musicians who were more into jazz.”

Needs Trying Two Causes Behinds Style Band Conflict Musician Jazz Singers Tunes Songwriters Singer Songwriters Ballads

Author:Van Morrison

“[Jazz musicians] couldn't cut rock. I had to be more limited and specific about what I was doing.”

Cutting Rocks Musician Jazz Jazz Music Jazz Musician

Author:Van Morrison

“We're [with Robbie Robertson ] jazz musicians. The context may be rock 'n' roll but it's still jazz. It's jazz and that means improvization...you play a tune the way it feels and you play it differently every time. It can never be the same.”

Way Feels May Mean Stills Play Rocks Musician Jazz Tunes Rock N Roll Jazz Music Jazz Musician

Author:Van Morrison

“Music had been going on a long time before that. You have to remember that before rock n' roll there were a bunch of jazz musicians all doing heroin. That sh*t has been around a long time.”

Long Has Beens Remember Rocks Musician Long Time Jazz Bunch Rock N Roll Jazz Music Heroin Jazz Musician

Author:Lemmy Kilmister

“Jazz musicians can be great teachers of business. Their creativity is not dependent on their mood, it does not have to be coaxed out of them, it has nothing to do with the phases of the moon or even how they feel that day. They go on stage and start playing. Being creative is their job.”

Feels Doe Jobs Creativity Creative Teacher Stage Goes On Moon Musician Jazz Mood Dependent Phases Be Creative Jazz Music Great Teacher Jazz Musician Phases Of The Moon

Author:John Kao

“Jazz is not about getting and playing whatever notes you want. It is about reworking themes in a manner that sounds good, that can be followed by the other musicians and that the audience enjoys. You cannot do that without first acquiring skills.”

Want Firsts Enjoy Sound Audience Skills Musician Jazz Notes Theme

Author:John Kao

“Companies have to take risks to get new knowledge, in a manner similar to how jazz musicians take risks when they go after a new approach to a tune or a performance.”

Company Risk Approach Musician Performances Jazz Tunes Jazz Music Jazz Musician New Knowledge New Approach

Author:John Kao

“I read an interview with a Japanese freestyle jazz musician once, and he said something like, "Everything I'm going to tell you is not going to be true." He's not saying, "I'm trying to lie to you." But he's kind of saying that you can never say what something really is.”

Trying Kind Said Lying Musician Jazz Being True Interviews Jazz Music Jazz Musician Freestyle

Author:Paul Beatty

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