Jazz Quotes

Excerpted from Basic Musicianship

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Stan Getz - "I learn something new every day."
Stan Getz - "You don't rehearse Jazz to death to get the camera angles."
Stan Getz - "We recorded to document ourselves, not to sell a lot of records." [P]
Stan Getz - "I cannot play a lie. I have to believe in what I play or it won't come out."
Stan Getz - "People involve themselves with the superficiality of Jazz without digging for its soul."
Stan Getz - "Musically, I love to talk just off the top of my head & that's what Jazz is all about."
Stan Getz - "A good quartet is like a good conversation among friends interacting to each other's ideas."
Stan Getz - "I never have any trouble playing anything I can think of. The trouble is thinking of what to play." [P]
Stan Getz - "I compulsively reach for perfection in music, often at the expense of everything else in my life." [P]
Stan Getz - "Other than conversation, no other art form can give the satisfaction of spontaneous interaction like Jazz."
Stan Getz - "You can read all the textbooks and listen to all the records, but you have to play with musicians that are better than you." [P]
Stan Getz - "There are four qualities essential to a great Jazzman: taste, courage, individuality & irreverence. These are the qualities I want to retain in my music." [P]
Gary Giddins - "Nobody knows where Jazz is going, because nobody has ever known where Jazz was going." [P]
Andrew Gilbert - "Jazz has the ability to absorb & transform influences from diverse musical styles."
Astrud Gilberto - "Whenever an artist chooses to guard their personal life and conduct themselves with discretion, this artist is invariably labeled eccentric or a recluse or difficult." [P]

Joao Gilberto - "When I sing, I think of a clear, open space and I'm going to play sound in it." [P]
Dizzy Gillespie - "It's taken me all my life to learn what not to play." [P]
Dizzy Gillespie - "Men have died for this music. You can't get more serious than that."
Dizzy Gillespie - "The sign of a mature musician is knowing what not to play." [P]
Dizzy Gillespie - "One of the reasons we're here is to be a part of this process of exchange."
Dizzy Gillespie - "I try to teach by example & not force ideas on a young musician. We're here to be part of a process of exchange."
Dizzy Gillespie - "As a musician, you have to keep one foot in the past and have one foot forward into the future."
Dizzy Gillespie - "They're not particular whether you're playing a flat 5th or a ruptured 129th as long as they can dance."
Philip Glass - "If you don't know what to do, there's actually a chance of doing something new." [P]
Robert Glasper - "Play for the spiritual aspect, the emotion." [P]
Benny Golson - "Jazz will only go where we the composers and musicians take it. It is up to us." [P]
Eddie Gomez - "I love it all." [P]
Benny Goodman - "You have to look good." [P]

Mick Goodrick - "The most difficult thing about finding your own path is that you are already on it." [P]
Dexter Gordon - "Jazz is a living music." [P]
Dexter Gordon - "If you can't play the Blues you might as well hang it up." [P]
Dexter Gordon - "Jazz is a beautiful word. I love it." [P]
Dexter Gordon - "When you know the lyrics to a tune, you have some kind of insight as to it's composition."
Dexter Gordon - "Jazz is a living music; since its beginning has expressed the feelings, dreams & hopes of the people."
Wycliffe Gordon - "The future of the trombone is great because there are some monster players out here." [P]

Norman Granz - "I'm concerned with trend. I don't know where Jazz fans will come from 20 years from now."
Norman Granz - "I don't think that Jazz, as art form, has any permanence attached to it, apart from the practitioners."
Norman Granz - "Jazz is America's own. It is played and listened to by all peoples in harmony together. Pigmentation differences have no place... as in genuine democracy, only performance counts."
Stephane Grappelli - "Start well and end well. The middle will look after itself." [P]
Stephane Grappelli - "Improvisation is a mystery. You can write a book but by the end no one still knows what it is." [P]
Lou Grassi - "I believe that music has the ability to improve everyone's life." [P]
Benny Green - "A Jazz musician is a juggler who uses harmonies instead of oranges." [P]
Benny Green - "Jazz music is a special skill that has brought pleasure to millions throughout the world."
Benny Green - "Art [Blakey] would take young people with a potential & help them develop a voice as a player & as a writer."
Freddie Greene - "Always pack your uniform on top."
Katie Greenwood - "Music isn't just learning notes & playing them. You learn notes to play the music of your soul."
Chris Griffin - "Jazz is like a great void, patiently waiting for a brave musician to take control of space and time." [P]
Johnny Griffin - "Jazz is music made by and for people who have chosen to feel good in spite of conditions." [P]
Bobby Hackett - "I loved every note." [P]

Charlie Haden - "We're here to bring beauty to the world & make a difference on this planet. That's what art forms are about."
Charlie Haden - "As long as musicians have passion for spontaneity & creating something that's never been before, Jazz will flourish."
Charlie Haden - "Creative Arts raise a person to another level of consciousness as if you could imagine life before words." [P]
Charlie Haden - "I have music inside me & I'm very lucky to be able to play music & that's the way that I try to do it."
Jim Hall - "Just to keep it interesting I'll tune the guitar randomly, so I don't know what's going to come out." [P]
Chico Hamilton - "I don't dig staying in one groove." [P]
Chico Hamilton - "Musicians have to suffer to a certain degree in order to obtain their outlet."
Scott Hamilton - "I'm playing what I like and hopefully getting to sound more like myself as years go by." [P]
Oscar Hammerstein II - "If you become a teacher, by your pupils you'll be taught." [P]
Oscar Hammerstein II - "You gotta have a dream. If you don't have a dream, how you gonna make a dream come true?" [P]
Oscar Hammerstein II - "Love in your heart wasn't put there to stay, Love isn't love 'til you give it away!"
Lionel Hampton - "Playing is my way of thinking, talking, communicating." [P]
Lionel Hampton - "Man, as long as people want to hear Jazz, I'll give it to them."
Lionel Hampton - "Music was our wife and we loved her. We stayed with her, clothed her and put diamond rings on her hands." [P]
Lionel Hampton - "It's always Jazz. You can put a new dress on her, a new hat, but no matter what kind of clothes she's the same old broad."
Slide Hampton - "You can have great musicians, but they don't necessarily play together." [P]

Herbie Hancock - "I try to practice with my life."
Herbie Hancock - "Jazz is about being in the moment." [P]
Herbie Hancock - "The true artform is being a human being."
Herbie Hancock - "The spirit of Jazz is the spirit of openness."
Herbie Hancock - "It is people's hearts that move the age."
Herbie Hancock - "I think I was supposed to play Jazz."
Herbie Hancock - "In the world of Art there are no wrong choices." [P]
Herbie Hancock - "I'm always looking to create new avenues or new visions of music."
Herbie Hancock - "Life is not about finding our limitations, it's about finding our infinity." [P]
Herbie Hancock - "The value of music is not dazzling yourself and others with technique."
Herbie Hancock - "Creativity shouldn't be following radio; it should be the other way around."
Herbie Hancock - "You can practice to learn technique, but I'm more interested in conceiving something in the moment."
Herbie Hancock - "Jazz translates the moment into a sense of inspiration for not only the musicians but for the listeners."
Herbie Hancock - "Creativity & artistic endeavors have a mission far beyond just making music for the sake of music." [P]
Herbie Hancock - "Jazz has borrowed from other genres of music & also has lent itself to other genres of music."
Herbie Hancock - "A great teacher stimulates his student's creativity enough so that they go out & find the answers themselves." [P]
W.C. Handy - "I think America concedes that true American music has sprung from the Negro."
W.C. Handy - "Life is like a trumpet. If you don't put anything into it, you don't get anything out." [P]
Roy Hargrove - "Let the music speak for itself." [P]
Roy Hargrove - "I'm going to make #music out of whatever style it is, being true to the artform itself." [P]
Tom Harrell - "Sounds of daily life are musical. I try to absorb the intricacies of sounds as if I were listening to music." [P]
Tom Harrell - "Whenever there's a change with Jazz & its aesthetics, it's almost always reflected with a change in the culture."
Tom Harrell - "Jazz is such a powerful cultural statement that it's almost as if it's intertwined with society."
Stefon Harris - "It's important to reflect on what made Jazz so special." [P]
Stefon Harris - "Words like 'creativity' in Jazz are overrated. The word should be 'authenticity.'" [P]
Coleman Hawkins - "Music should always be an adventure." [P]
Coleman Hawkins - "If you don't make mistakes, you aren't really trying."
Coleman Hawkins - "You can separate the men from the boys and ballads."

More Jazz quotes & quotations:

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