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People do not retire. They are retired by others.

Duke Ellington

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.
DUKE ELLINGTON

Death Hide Place Walk
It don’t mean a thing if it ain’t got that swing.
DUKE ELLINGTON

Meaning Yourself
There are 2 rules in life: Number 1- Never quit. Number2- Never forget rule number 1.
DUKE ELLINGTON

Forget Inspirational Life Rule
Problems are chances for us to do our best.
DUKE ELLINGTON

Best Chance Ourselves Problem
Music is my mistress and she plays second fiddle to no one.
DUKE ELLINGTON

Herself Mistress Music Play
The wise musicians are those who play what they can master.
DUKE ELLINGTON

Knowledge Master Musician
What does music mean to you? What would you do without music?
DUKE ELLINGTON

Important Meaning Music Yourself
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!
DUKE ELLINGTON

Money Myself Pay Togetherness
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.
DUKE ELLINGTON

Contribution Expression Music Myself Problem
There is no art without intention.
DUKE ELLINGTON

Art Creation Creativity Intention One Liner
There are two kinds of music. Good music, and the other kind.
DUKE ELLINGTON

Goodness Kind Music
Art is dangerous. It is one of the attractions: when it ceases to be dangerous, you don’t want it.
DUKE ELLINGTON

Art Dangerous Oneself Yourself
It’s like an act of murder – you play with intent to commit something.
DUKE ELLINGTON

Act Commitment Murder Play Yourself
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 ELLINGTON

Appearance Interest Myself Realize Right
A goal is a dream with a finish line.
DUKE ELLINGTON

Dreams Finish Goal
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.
DUKE ELLINGTON

Live Music Myself Occupation Profession
There is hardly any money interest in art, and music will be there when money is gone.
DUKE ELLINGTON

Art Interest Money Music
Selfishness can be a virtue. Selfishness is essential to survival, and without survival we cannot protect those whom we love more than ourselves.
DUKE ELLINGTON

Ourselves Selfish Survive Virtue
The Europeans who went to Africa came back with “modern’ art. What is more African than a Picasso?
DUKE ELLINGTON

Art Creativity Modern
Dancing 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 ELLINGTON

Communication Dance Important Myself People
You have to stop listening in categories. The music is either good or it’s bad.
DUKE ELLINGTON

Bad Category Goodness Listening Stop
Love is indescribable and unconditional. I could tell you a thousand things that it is not, but not one that it is. Either you have it or you haven’t; there’s no proof of it.
DUKE ELLINGTON

Evidence Love Myself Yourself
Tomorrow is in the wings waiting for you to sound her entrance fanfare.
DUKE ELLINGTON

Entrance Sound Wings
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.
DUKE ELLINGTON

Believe Black Kind White Yourself
I merely took the energy it takes to pout and wrote some blues.
DUKE ELLINGTON

Blue Energy Myself Writing
Of the One O’Clock Lab Band after hearing their performance, and sitting in with them at the White House: “I wish it were mine”.
DUKE ELLINGTON

Hear Myself Performance
People do not retire. They are retired by others.
DUKE ELLINGTON

People Retirement

People do not retire. They are retired by others.

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People do not retire. They are retired by others.

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