Our basic audience begins with creaking elderly types of twenty-three and above.

- Paul Desmond

I discovered early in life that if you take gym first period, you can go into the wrestling room and sit in the corner and sleep.

- Paul Desmond

It was never supposed to be a hit. It was supposed to be a Joe Morello drum solo.

- Paul Desmond

Milton, of all people, gave the most perfect definition of the state of mind required to play jazz: ' with wanton heed and giddy cunning.' That's how…

- Paul Desmond

We're working as if it were going out of style-which of course it is.

- Paul Desmond

I would like to thank my father who discouraged me from playing the violin at an early age.

- Paul Desmond

I tried practicing for a few weeks and ended up playing too fast.

- Paul Desmond

Writing is like jazz. It can be learned, but it can't be taught.

- Paul Desmond

Complexity can be a trap. You can have a ball developing a phrase, inverting it, playing it in different keys and times and all. But it's really more…

- Paul Desmond