When I get a dog, I'll probably name it "Bird."
Music is your own experience, your thoughts, your wisdom. If you don't live it, it won't come out of your horn. They teach you there's a boundary line to music. But, man, there's no boundary line to art.
There's nothing wrong with it. It's only a word. What's in a name? Nothing! Cats say, Call me Muhammed so-and-so. But what's the difference? A name doesn't make the music. It's just called that to differentiate it from other types of music.
Jazz is known all over the world as an American musical art form and thats it. No America, no jazz. I've seen people try to connect it to other countries, for instance to Africa, but it doesn't have a damn thing to do with Africa.
Just because Im playing jazz I dont forget about me. I play or write me the way I feel through jazz, or whatever. Music is, or was, a language of the emotions.
Anyone can make the simple complicated. Creativity is making the complicated simple.
I dont believe in categories of any kind, and when you speak of problems between blacks and whites in the U.S.A. you are referring to categories again.
There is no art without intention.
A jazz musician is not a jazz musician when he or she is eating dinner or when he or she is with his parents or spouse or neighbors. He's above all a human being . . . the true art form is being a human being.
You can play a shoestring if youre sincere.
[Bebop is] Chinese music.
When you're creating your own shit, man, even the sky ain't the limit.
I like to sleep. There is no set time of day for sleep. You sleep when youre tired, thats all there is to it.
Up to seven people per foot of walkway a minute is a nice bustle. People can create social conditions and people can change them.
Good jazz is when the leader jumps on the piano, waves his arms, and yells. Fine jazz is when a tenorman lifts his foot in the air. Great jazz is when he heaves a piercing note for 32 bars and collapses on his hands and knees. A pure genius of jazz is manifested when he and the rest of the orchestra run around the room while the rhythm section grimaces and dances around their instruments.
