black
grey
blue
red
brown
white

Problems are chances for us to do our best.

Duke Ellington

If you have a great band with a mediocre drummer, you have a mediocre band. If you have a mediocre band with a great drummer, you have a great band!
DUKE ELLINGTON

Greatness Mediocre Musician Yourself
It don’t mean a thing if it ain’t got that swing.
DUKE ELLINGTON

Meaning Yourself
A musical profit outweighs a financial loss.
DUKE ELLINGTON

Financial Loss Musical Profit
The most important thing I look for in a musician is whether he knows how to listen.
DUKE ELLINGTON

Himself Important Known Listening Musician
It’s like an act of murder – you play with intent to commit something.
DUKE ELLINGTON

Act Commitment Murder Play Yourself
Sing sweet, but put a little dirt in it.
DUKE ELLINGTON

Music Sing Song Sweet
Problems are chances for us to do our best.
DUKE ELLINGTON

Best Chance Ourselves Problem
Everyone prays in their own language, and there is no language that God does not understand.
DUKE ELLINGTON

God Language Prayer Understand
Everybody in Canada seemed to listen to what they enjoyed, and nobody could tell them what to like, or what was the popular, or what was the In thing. Even today, it is very hard to brainwash a Canadian.
DUKE ELLINGTON

Country Enjoyment Listening Popular
You have to stop listening in categories. The music is either good or it’s bad.
DUKE ELLINGTON

Bad Category Goodness Listening Stop
Playing ‘bop’ is like playing Scrabble with all the vowels missing.
DUKE ELLINGTON

Missing Play
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.
DUKE ELLINGTON

Bond Friendship Myself Right
The Europeans who went to Africa came back with “modern’ art. What is more African than a Picasso?
DUKE ELLINGTON

Art Creativity Modern
By and large, jazz has always been like the kind of a man you wouldn’t want your daughter to associate with.
DUKE ELLINGTON

Association Kind Man Yourself
There is no art when one does something without intention.
DUKE ELLINGTON

Art Intention
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.
DUKE ELLINGTON

Association Audience Listening Music Perspective Play

Problems are chances for us to do our best.

Related Topics

Popular Authors

Problems are chances for us to do our best.

Related Topics

Popular Authors

More Duke Ellington Quotes