I never had much interest in the piano until I realized that every time I played, a girl would appear on the piano bench to my left and another to my right.
DUKE ELLINGTONOn becoming more acquainted with the word of the Bible, I began to understand so much more of what I had been taught, and of what I had learned about life and about the people in mine.
More Duke Ellington Quotes
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What does music mean to you? What would you do without music?
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Gray skies are just clouds passing over.
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A musical profit outweighs a financial loss.
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Sing sweet, but put a little dirt in it.
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I like any and all of my associations with music: writing, playing, and listening. We write and play from our perspective, and the audience listens from its perspective. If and when we agree, I am lucky.
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Problems are chances for us to do our best.
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I fluffed off the guy who kept requesting tunes all night, then found out he was the King’s son.
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I merely took the energy it takes to pout and wrote some blues.
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Simplicity is a most complex form.
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It don’t mean a thing if it ain’t got that swing.
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New 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.
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My mother told me I was blessed, and I have always taken her word for it. Being born of – or reincarnated from – royalty is nothing Like being blessed. Royalty is inherited from another human being; blessedness comes from God.
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Billy Strayhorn was my right arm, my left arm, all the eyes in the back of my head, my brainwaves in his head, and his in mine.
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Now I can say loudly and openly what I have been saying to myself on my knees.
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Every man prays in his own language.
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