What does music mean to you? What would you do without music?
DUKE ELLINGTONBy and large, jazz has always been like the kind of a man you wouldn’t want your daughter to associate with.
More Duke Ellington Quotes
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Jazz today, as always in the past, is a matter of thoughtful creation, not mere unaided instinct.
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It is becoming increasingly difficult to decide where jazz starts or where it stops, where Tin Pan Alley begins and jazz ends, or even where the borderline lies between between classical music and jazz. I feel there is no boundary line
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I don’t need time, I need a deadline.
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Music is my mistress and she plays second fiddle to no one.
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Problems are chances for us to do our best.
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Everyone prays in their own language, and there is no language that God does not understand.
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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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A musical profit outweighs a financial loss.
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It don’t mean a thing if it ain’t got that swing.
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The most important thing I look for in a musician is whether he knows how to listen.
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The problem of expressing the contributions that Benny Carter has made to popular music is so tremendous it completely fazes me, so extraordinary a musician is he.
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Self-discipline, as a virtue or an acquired asset, can be invaluable to anyone.
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It’s like an act of murder – you play with intent to commit something.
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Music is the tonal reflection of beauty.
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Every man prays in his own language.
DUKE ELLINGTON