Music isn't about music, it's about life.
Herbie HancockRead
It's not easy to play in a framework that requires simplicity and to tastefully find ways to interject the kind of freedom that we have in playing jazz.
Interpretation
Balancing simplicity and freedom in jazz can be challenging.
Herbie Hancock emphasizes the complex interplay between the structured elements of jazz and the spontaneous creativity that defines the genre. While adhering to a framework can bring clarity, true artistry in jazz lies in the ability to express freedom within those bounds, showcasing the tension between discipline and improvisation.
In practice
During a music class discussion about improvisation techniques.
Music isn't about music, it's about life.
I don't mind being classified as a jazz artist, but I do mind being restricted to being a jazz artist. My foundation has been in jazz, though I didn't really start out that way. I started in classical music, but my formative years were in jazz, and it makes a great foundation.
In World War II, jazz absolutely was the music of freedom, and then in the Cold War, behind the Iron Curtain, same thing. It was all underground, but they needed the food of freedom that jazz offered.
I think people have learned that Herbie Hancock can be defined as someone that you won't be able to figure out what he's going to do next. The sky is the limit as far as I'm concerned.
One thing that sticks in my mind is that jazz means freedom and openness. It's a music that, although it developed out of the African American experience, speaks more about the human experience than the experience of a particular people.
I started off with classical music, and I got into jazz when I was about 14 years old. And I've been playing jazz ever since.
The major rock instruments and classical instruments were designed for performance, for sharing the music with an audience, and then later people put microphones on them and recorded them. But for electronic music, the opposite was true - they're designed in laboratories, and later, we tried to put them on stage.
I know people said I wasn't selling out in America, but that was entirely untrue. We sold out all over the world, and every night I looked out into the fans and those front rows that you're talking about, the tears, the honesty, the inability to not be completely overjoyed because they felt accepted.
It's very strange how electronic music formatted itself and forgot that its roots are about the surprise, freedom, and the acceptance of every race, gender, and style of music into this big party. Instead, it started to become this electronic lifestyle which also involved the glorification of technology.
When I auditioned for my high school band the band director was excited because my father was known to be a great musician. When he heard me, he said 'Are you sure you're Ellis's son?'
I don't care where the Cure is placed in the pantheon of rock. I don't care if we're perceived as relevant. We're never worried how we fit in. I don't even want to fit in.
At night in the country, you'd be surprised how that music carries. You could hear my guitar way before you get to the house, and you could hear the peoples hollerin' and screamin'.
Subscribe for the occasional hand-picked quote. No noise.