Don’t play what’s there, play what’s not there.
MILES DAVISMusic is the framework around the silence.
More Miles Davis Quotes
-
-
I’ll play it first and figure out what it’s called later.
MILES DAVIS -
We’re not going to play the blues anymore. Let the white folks play the blues. They got ’em, so they can keep ’em.
MILES DAVIS -
Do not fear mistakes. There are none.
MILES DAVIS -
The thing to judge in any jazz artist is, does the man project and does he have ideas.
MILES DAVIS -
Always look ahead, but never look back.
MILES DAVIS -
You have to practice for a long time before you can learn to sound like yourself.
MILES DAVIS -
It takes a long time to sound like yourself.
MILES DAVIS -
I don’t pay no attention to what critics say about me, the good or the bad. The toughest critic I got is myself…and I’m too vain to play anything I think is bad.
MILES DAVIS -
I used to enjoy all the white bands when I was a kid listening to the radio. But the record companies, they take music and label it – like, they say “rock”. Because the white singers can’t sound like James Brown, they call him “soul”. They’ve been doing that for years. That’s the prejudice crap.
MILES DAVIS -
Jazz is like blues with a shot of heroin!
MILES DAVIS -
It took me twenty years study and practice to work up to what I wanted to play in this performance. How can she expect to listen five minutes and understand it?
MILES DAVIS -
It’s not the notes you play, it’s the notes you don’t play.
MILES DAVIS -
I know what I’ve done for music, but don’t call me a legend. Just call me Miles Davis.
MILES DAVIS -
At least one day out of the year all musicans should just put their instruments down, and give thanks to Duke Ellington.
MILES DAVIS -
I ain’t no entertainer, and ain’t trying to be one. I am one thing, a musician.
MILES DAVIS






