The memory of things gone is important to a jazz musician. Things like old folks singing in the moonlight in the back yard on a hot night or something said long ago.
Louis ArmstrongRead
If you have to ask what jazz is, you'll never know.
Interpretation
Understanding jazz goes beyond just asking questions; it involves an experiential grasp of the art form.
This quote by Louis Armstrong suggests that jazz is an art form that cannot be fully comprehended through mere inquiry or intellectual exploration. Instead, it implies that true understanding comes from personal experience and immersion in the music itself. The essence of jazz lies in its improvisational nature and emotional expression, which words alone cannot capture, signifying that some things in life must be felt to be understood.
In practice
This quote can be used in a speech about the importance of experiencing art rather than just studying it.
The memory of things gone is important to a jazz musician. Things like old folks singing in the moonlight in the back yard on a hot night or something said long ago.
Making money ain't nothing exciting to me. You might be able to buy a little better booze than the wino on the corner. But you get sick just like the next cat and when you die you're just as graveyard dead as he is.
Very few of the men whose names have become great in the early pioneering of jazz and of swing were trained in music at all. They were born musicians: they felt their music and played by ear and memory. That was the way it was with the great Dixieland Five.
My whole life, my whole soul, my whole spirit is to blow that horn.
I've Got the World on a String.
It's America's classical music ... this becomes our tradition ... the bottom line of any country in the world is what did we contribute to the world? ... we contributed Louis Armstrong
Rock 'n' roll offered me a platform to speak what I felt. It also offered me a platform to support my mama and my brothers and sisters - twelve children.
A great song can make a terrible singer sound good, but a good singer - you put a great song on top of that, you're really in great shape!
Nobody could have predicted the effect of John Bonham's drum introduction on 'Good Times, Bad Times,' because no matter what he'd played in before, he'd never had the chance to flex his muscles and play like John Bonham.
When you pay your money to see me, I want you to have the best concert you can have from me.
I must tell you I take terrible risks. Because my playing is very clear, when I make a mistake you hear it. If you want me to play only the notes without any specific dynamics, I will never make one mistake. Never be afraid to dare.
My songs speak for themselves. The musicians who play on them and the way they sound and where they were recorded and the way they were recorded is the old Nashville way ... they sound as country or more country than a lot of things that are on country radio.
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