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Don’t just play the licks you know. We’re all improvising all the time – it’s good to recognize that and embrace it.

Bobby McFerrin

Improvisation means coming to the situation without rigid expectations or preconceptions. The key to improvisation is motion.
BOBBY MCFERRIN

Expectations Keys Mean
If I stand there, appreciating the world around me as full of amazing sounds and the possibility of new ones,
BOBBY MCFERRIN

People Teaching Thinking
Musicians are the architects of heaven.
BOBBY MCFERRIN

Architect Heaven Musician
Part of our responsibility as parents, as adults, is to set examples for children. But we have to like children in order to be really happy fulfilled adults
BOBBY MCFERRIN

Children Life Responsibility
I couldn’t do anything without faith. I couldn’t open up my eyes, I couldn’t walk, I couldn’t speak, I couldn’t sing.
BOBBY MCFERRIN

Eye Speak Walks
I’d actually been making my living as an organist with bands since I was probably 15 or 16 years old, and then as a senior in high school I put together a jazz quintet called The Bobby Mack Jazz Quintet.
BOBBY MCFERRIN

Actually Experience People School Senior Years
The audience is like my instrument. It’s not just me up there, it’s collaborative.
BOBBY MCFERRIN

Audience Instruments Performing
You can try a new way of singing a song you’ve performed for years, a new way of showing your family your love for them, or a new recipe.
BOBBY MCFERRIN

Recipe Show Singing Try Way
When we listen to improvisational jazz, or solo classical violinists, the way they phrase and inflect melodies feels vocal, like they’re talking to us.
BOBBY MCFERRIN

Moving Song Talking
I like a very dark house, just black. I sit there and just think. Once I’m still and quiet inside, I’ll begin. It’s very personal; it has to be.
BOBBY MCFERRIN

Back Dark Sit Song Thinking
So I want to come back here [to Israel] to see the places that I read about every day. It’s very important to my faith to feed [my] spirit in Israel.
BOBBY MCFERRIN

Bible Country Morning People Spirit
I actually fought the idea for a while because it seemed almost too radical, but it became obvious what I was supposed to be doing.
BOBBY MCFERRIN

Actually Almost Fought Idea Suppose
One song may be Bach, the next blues, a song from TV, or a nursery rhyme or jazz piece.
BOBBY MCFERRIN

Nursery One Piece Rhyme Song Television
Then I came up with this crazy idea just to walk out on the stage with no band at all and just start singing whatever came to mind.
BOBBY MCFERRIN

Crazy Ideas Mind
Here’s a little song I wrote You might want to sing it note for note Don’t worry, be happy In every life we have some trouble But when you worry you make it double Don’t worry, be happy Don’t worry, be happy now
BOBBY MCFERRIN

Doubt Little Song Want Worry
I think play and joy and feeling good deserve more of our time. I don’t see why adults are supposed to grow out of those things.
BOBBY MCFERRIN

Deserve More Play Thinking

Don’t just play the licks you know. We’re all improvising all the time – it’s good to recognize that and embrace it.

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Don’t just play the licks you know. We’re all improvising all the time – it’s good to recognize that and embrace it.

Related Topics

Popular Authors

More Bobby McFerrin Quotes