Jazz music is America's past and its potential, summed up and sanctified and accessible to anybody who learns to listen to, feel, and understand it. ….

Don't settle for style. Succeed in substance..

We're blues people. And blues never lets tragedy have the last word..

Trumpet players are just belligerant, and cocky, and you know, just hard-headed..

Don't wish for someone else to do later what you can do now..

Those who play for applause....Tha t’s all they get..

Only a few act - the rest of us reap the benefits of their risk..

If you want to be different, do something different..

Love is the spiritual essence of what we do. Technique is the manifestation of the preparation and investment as a result of the love..

Jazz music is the power of now. There is no script. It's conversation. The emotion is given to you by musicians as they make split-second decisions t….

As long as there is democracy, there will be people wanting to play jazz because nothing else will ever so perfectly capture the democratic process i….

Music is always for the listener, but the first listener is always the musician.

The real power of Jazz is that a group of people can come together and create improvised art and negotiate their agendas... and that negotiation is t….

You can reach a situation where things of intelligence and refinement and culture can be considered elite, and things that are crass and ignorant can….

Music is the art of all the invisible things that are real. Art, emotion, spiritual essence, consciousness - these things are hard to prove. Music he….

I always like to play very contemporary concepts of swing right next to New Orleans music because it highlights continuum..

How great musicians demonstrate a mutual respect and trust on the bandstand can alter your outlook on the world and enrich every aspect of your life,….

It's harder to build than destroy. To build is to engage and change. In jazz, we call progressing harmonies changes. Changes are like obstacles on a ….

Ethics are more important than laws. Which means that the exact note is less important than the feeling of the note..

The only justification for looking down on anyone is that you're going to stop and pick them up..

The best way to be, is to do..