Jazz is about freedom within discipline. Usually a dictatorship like in Russia and Germany will prevent jazz from being played because it just seemed…

- Dave Brubeck

I got a poster from Columbia Records, and there's Miles Davis, Charlie Mingus, Ellington, Count Basie - everybody in that poster has died, I'm the on…

- Dave Brubeck

Art may not have the power to change the course of history, but it can provide a perspective on historical events that needs to be heard, even if it'…

- Dave Brubeck

I don't think you can separate a person's "style" and his persona. If you're writing or improvising honestly, you will inevitably reflect who you are.

- Dave Brubeck

When things are going well, I hate to quit.

- Dave Brubeck

Kinship doesn't come from skin color. It's in your soul and your mind.

- Dave Brubeck

Don't be a perfectionist... leave that to the classical musicians.

- Dave Brubeck

There's a way of playing safe, there's a way of using tricks and there's the way I like to play which is dangerously where you're going to take a cha…

- Dave Brubeck

I’m beginning to understand myself. But it would have been great to be able to understand myself when I was 20 rather than when I was 82.

- Dave Brubeck