Now I can say loudly and openly what I have been saying to myself on my knees.
DUKE ELLINGTONArt is dangerous. It is one of the attractions: when it ceases to be dangerous, you don’t want it.
More Duke Ellington Quotes
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Every man prays in his own language.
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There is nothing to keeping a band together. You simply have to have a gimmick, and the gimmick I use is to pay them money!
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Jazz is a good barometer of freedom.
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Tomorrow is in the wings waiting for you to sound her entrance fanfare.
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Create, and be true to yourself, and depend only on your own good taste.
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Music, 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.
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Fate is being kind to me. Fate doesn’t want me to be too famous too young.
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Be a number one yourself. And not a number two somebody else.
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If anybody was Mr. Jazz it was Louis Armstrong. He was the epitome of jazz and always will be. He is what I call an American standard, an American original.
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The wise musicians are those who play what they can master.
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There is no art when one does something without intention.
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Music is my mistress and she plays second fiddle to no one.
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I 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.
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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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Gray skies are just clouds passing over.
DUKE ELLINGTON