There are 2 rules in life: Number 1- Never quit. Number2- Never forget rule number 1.
DUKE ELLINGTONThere are 2 rules in life: Number 1- Never quit. Number2- Never forget rule number 1.
DUKE ELLINGTONMusic is my mistress and she plays second fiddle to no one.
DUKE ELLINGTONThe wise musicians are those who play what they can master.
DUKE ELLINGTONDancing is very important to people who play music with a beat. I think that people who don’t dance, or who never did dance, don’t really understand the beat. I know musicians who don’t and never did dance, and they have difficulty communicating.
DUKE ELLINGTONFate is being kind to me. Fate doesn’t want me to be too famous too young.
DUKE ELLINGTONI don’t believe in categories of any kind, and when you speak of problems between blacks and whites in the U.S.A. you are referring to categories again.
DUKE ELLINGTONPlaying ‘bop’ is like playing Scrabble with all the vowels missing.
DUKE ELLINGTONMy biggest kick in music -playing or writing- is when I have a problem. Without a problem to solve, how much interest do you take in anything?
DUKE ELLINGTONI don’t need time. What I need is a deadline!
DUKE ELLINGTONA Satin Doll is a woman who is as pretty on the inside as she is on the outside.
DUKE ELLINGTONThe Europeans who went to Africa came back with “modern’ art. What is more African than a Picasso?
DUKE ELLINGTONNew music? Hell, there’s been no new music since Stravinsky.
DUKE ELLINGTONMusic, of course, is what I hear and something that I more or less live by. It’s not an occupation or profession, it’s a compulsion.
DUKE ELLINGTONOf the One O’Clock Lab Band after hearing their performance, and sitting in with them at the White House: “I wish it were mine”.
DUKE ELLINGTONBe a number one yourself. And not a number two somebody else.
DUKE ELLINGTONNew York is a place where the rich walk, the poor drive Cadillacs, and beggars die of malnutrition with thousands of dollars hidden in their mattresses.
DUKE ELLINGTON