Create, and be true to yourself, and depend only on your own good taste.
DUKE ELLINGTONCreate, and be true to yourself, and depend only on your own good taste.
DUKE ELLINGTONNow I can say loudly and openly what I have been saying to myself on my knees.
DUKE ELLINGTONI 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 ELLINGTONA problem is a chance for you to do your best.
DUKE ELLINGTONNew music? Hell, there’s been no new music since Stravinsky.
DUKE ELLINGTONSelfishness can be a virtue. Selfishness is essential to survival, and without survival we cannot protect those whom we love more than ourselves.
DUKE ELLINGTONBy and large, jazz has always been like the kind of a man you wouldn’t want your daughter to associate with.
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 ELLINGTONI fluffed off the guy who kept requesting tunes all night, then found out he was the King’s son.
DUKE ELLINGTONI 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 ELLINGTONA goal is a dream with a finish line.
DUKE ELLINGTONSimplicity is a most complex form.
DUKE ELLINGTONEverybody 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 ELLINGTONThere are two kinds of music. Good music, and the other kind.
DUKE ELLINGTONThere are two kinds of worries – those you can do something about and those you can’t. Don’t spend any time on the latter.
DUKE ELLINGTONJazz today, as always in the past, is a matter of thoughtful creation, not mere unaided instinct.
DUKE ELLINGTON