[Dixielandjazz] Jazz Quotes

[Randy Fendrick]

Quotable quotes......

"I like the girls to match the upholstery of the car."
  -Charlie Barnet-

"I wish you wouldn't make the strings such an important part of your  
arrangements because frankly they're only a tax dodge!"
-Tommy Dorsey (to arranger Nelson Riddle)-

"Tastes are created by the business interests. How else can you  
explain the popularity of Al Hirt?"
-Charles Mingus-

"The outer space beings are my brothers. They sent me here. They  
already know my music."
-Sun Ra-

"I discovered early in life that if you take gym first period, you can  
go into the wrestling room and sit in the corner and sleep."
  -Paul Desmond

"I was very happy and secure until I went into the army. Then I  
started to feel there was something I should know that I didn't know."
-Bill Evans-

"Jazz is the folk music of the machine age."
-Paul Whiteman-

"Are big bands coming back? Sure, every football season."
-Woody Herman-

"Blues is to jazz what yeast is to bread-without it, it's flat."
-Carmen McCrae-

"Giving jazz the Congressional seal of approval is a little like  
making Huck Finn an honorary Boy Scout.'
-Melvin Maddocks-

"I don't want no drummer. I set the tempo."
-Bessie Smith-

"I am the world's laziest writer."
-Oscar Peterson-

"If someone has been escaping reality, I don't expect him to dig my  
music."
-Charles Mingus -

"Miles was a soul man, a sound, a black Humphrey Bogart. He was also  
an insufferable prick."
-Albert Goldman-

"It's taken me all my life to learn what not to play."
-Dizzy Gillespie-

"I don't mind being the butt of a joke-if it's a funny joke."
-Kenny G.-

"Those people were mavericks. The only person who wanted them was me.  
I mean, was Gene Krupa hard to get? Was Bunny Berigan hard to get?"
-Benny Goodman-

"I spent a lot of time playing in miserable places that were not a lot  
of fun. Somebody once said it is character building and I was like: My  
character is just fine."
-Diana Krall-

"It's not the mistakes that count, it's what you do after them that  
counts."
-Thelonious Monk