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Certain drummers drop time, and I like to play on top of the beat.

Miles Davis

If you sacrifice your art because of some woman, or some man, or for some color, or for some wealth, you can’t be trusted.
MILES DAVIS

Art Man Sacrifice Trust Woman Yourself
Knowledge is freedom and ignorance is slavery.
MILES DAVIS

Freedom Ignorance Knowledge Slave
[Jazz musicians] feel comfortable with their clichés, you know.
MILES DAVIS

Comfortable Feeling Known
Bebop didn’t have the humanity of Duke Ellington. It didn’t even have that recognizable thing. Bird and Diz were great, fantastic, challenging – but they weren’t sweet.
MILES DAVIS

Challenge Greatness Humanity Recognition Sweet
I ain’t no entertainer, and ain’t trying to be one. I am one thing, a musician.
MILES DAVIS

Entertainment Musician Myself Trying
I usually write from the rhythm section…If a drummer got a funky beat on some things – like a half-shuffle or a shuffle or a backbeat that’s even – I can write something.
MILES DAVIS

Myself Rhythm Writing
If somebody told me I only had an hour to live, I’d spend it choking a white man. I’d do it nice and slow.
MILES DAVIS

Kill Live Man Myself Slow White
Some musicians play with their heart, you know what I mean? I don’t know what to tell a person that can’t – if you can’t tell a person what you’re talkin’ about when they’re rushin’ or droppin’ the tempo, you get somebody else.
MILES DAVIS

Heart Known Musician Person Play Yourself
Music is the framework around the silence.
MILES DAVIS

Framework Music Perspective Silence
You can tell whether a person plays well or not by the way he carries the instrument, whether it means something to him or not.
MILES DAVIS

Instrument Person Play Yourself
He sounded to me like he’s supposed to be the savior of jazz. Sometimes people speak as though someone asked them a question. Well, no one asked him a question.
MILES DAVIS

Oneself People Question Sound Time
Do not fear mistakes. There are none.
MILES DAVIS

Fear Instrument Mistake Musician None One Liner
Music is an addiction.
MILES DAVIS

Addiction Music One Liner
At least one day out of the year all musicans should just put their instruments down, and give thanks to Duke Ellington.
MILES DAVIS

Instrument Musician Oneself Thankful
White folks always think that you have to have a label on everything – you know what I mean?
MILES DAVIS

Known Label Thinking Yourself
I never thought Jazz was meant to be a museum piece like other dead things once considered artistic.
MILES DAVIS

Artistic Death Music Pieces

Certain drummers drop time, and I like to play on top of the beat.

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Certain drummers drop time, and I like to play on top of the beat.

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