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My 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 Marsalis

If it’s not going to sound like Terrapin Station, what’s the point of playing Terrapin Station?
BRANFORD MARSALIS

Ifs Sound Stations
Pop doesn’t really look back. It can’t. What makes pop work is simplicity.
BRANFORD MARSALIS

Looks Music Simplicity
You don’t know what you like, you like what you know. In order to know what you like, you have to know everything.
BRANFORD MARSALIS

Jazz Music Order
Walter Beasley is an anomaly: a successful performing musician who possesses the rare skill of understanding the musical process beyond the intuitive. T
BRANFORD MARSALIS

Skills Successful Understanding
You know, being America, being the land of “number ones”, everyone wants to be a leader before they follow.
BRANFORD MARSALIS

Country Land Numbers
his special ability enables Walter to communicate with aspiring musicians in a way that removes the sense of mystery that sometimes enshrouds our profession.
BRANFORD MARSALIS

Enshroud Profession Remove Special
Coltrane came to New Orleans one day and he was talking about the jazz scene. And Coltrane mentions that the problem with jazz was that there were too few groups.
BRANFORD MARSALIS

Day New Country Talking
If I were like a lot of other people, then it wouldn’t be fun; but since I’m like me, it’s okay.
BRANFORD MARSALIS

Fun Okay People
I 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 MARSALIS

Artist Records Sound
My job is to write songs that have emotional meaning to me.
BRANFORD MARSALIS

Jobs Music Song
What you have to do is play a couple of songs and then get off the stage because everything that trails it sounds stupid.
BRANFORD MARSALIS

Couple Sound Stupid Trails
Humans 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 MARSALIS

Inspiring Men Perfect
One 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 MARSALIS

Community Halloween Successful
I 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 MARSALIS

Care Swings Use
You hear it in your brain. Whatever makes sense. Some songs work well as quartet songs, sometimes they don’t.
BRANFORD MARSALIS

Brain Sometimes Song
The piano is the X factor. People have a tough time following the structures when there’s no piano there, spelling it out. It makes it more easily understood, particularly to people who don’t know as much about music.
BRANFORD MARSALIS

People Piano Times Tough

My 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.

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My 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.

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Popular Authors

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