So much of Jazz doesn’t have an audience other than music students or musicians.
BRANFORD MARSALISSo much of Jazz doesn’t have an audience other than music students or musicians.
BRANFORD MARSALISI like to make records sound good. I’m more like a reducer than a producer. If an artist cannot produce themselves, what’s the point?
BRANFORD MARSALISMy dad was a musician, it was just what he did, like another guy’s dad drives a meat truck. Our house was normal. We weren’t taken with the fact our dad was a musician.
BRANFORD MARSALISOne of the things that’s clear to me from interviews that I’ve read is that the more popular successful jazz musicians had audiences above and beyond the music community.
BRANFORD MARSALISOne of the things that I loved about listening to Miles Davis is that Miles always had an instinct for which musicians were great for what situations. He could always pick a band, and that was the thing that separated him from everybody else.
BRANFORD MARSALISIf it’s not going to sound like Terrapin Station, what’s the point of playing Terrapin Station?
BRANFORD MARSALISYou don’t know what you like, you like what you know. In order to know what you like, you have to know everything.
BRANFORD MARSALISWhen you’re dealing with music without words, titles are more a means of identification than anything else. What’s the point of getting lofty?
BRANFORD MARSALISHumans are imperfect. That’s one of the reasons that classical and jazz are in trouble. We’re on the quest for the perfect performance and every note has to be right. Man, every note is not right in life.
BRANFORD MARSALISI don’t care who likes it or buys it. Because if you use that criterion, Mozart would have never written Don Giovanni, Charlie Parker never would have played anything but swing music. There comes a point at which you have to stand up and say, this is what I have to do.
BRANFORD MARSALISI think that if you keep banging at the door all you need is a little foothold, a little tiny foothold, and then the rest will take care of itself.
BRANFORD MARSALISWalter Beasley is an anomaly: a successful performing musician who possesses the rare skill of understanding the musical process beyond the intuitive. T
BRANFORD MARSALISWhat you have to do is play a couple of songs and then get off the stage because everything that trails it sounds stupid.
BRANFORD MARSALISMy job is to write songs that have emotional meaning to me.
BRANFORD MARSALISThe whole point is, give me a break with the standards. You go to the average jazz label and suggest a record and they want to know which standards you’re going to play. I’m saying let’s break the formula.
BRANFORD MARSALISThe biggest problem with American music right now, is that kids don’t listen. They come by it honestly, Americans don’t listen anyway.
BRANFORD MARSALIS