Aaron Copland

Music that is born complex is not inherently better or worse than music that is born simple.

Some twenty years ago, during the course of a memorable evening at the Stravinskys’ home in Los Angeles, the venerable maestro turned to me and said in no uncertain terms: ‘My dear, you should conduct your own music. All composers should conduct their own music!

The main thing is to be satisfied with your work yourself. It’s useless to have an audience happy if you are not happy.

Is there a meaning to music? Yes. Can you state in so many words what the meaning is? No.

When I speak of the gifted listener, I am thinking of the nonmusician primarily, of the listener who intends to retain his amateur status. It is the thought of just such a listener that excites the composer in me.

If one were asked to name one musician who came closest to composing without human flaw, I suppose general consensus would choose Johann Sebastian Bach.

There’s a spiritual satisfaction that one gets from listening and playing good Jazz.

Music should strike fire from the heart of man and bring tears to the eyes of woman.

There are notes between notes, you know.

A musician’s responsibility is to get as much of his art across to the public as possible.

Jazz is one of the best things that you can find in your life, it can always be your friend.

I merely took the energy it takes to pout and wrote some blues.

It’s not the notes you play, it’s the notes you don’t play.

I haven’t got a great jazz band and I don’t want one. Some of the critics, Down Beat’s among them, point their fingers at us and charge us with forsaking real jazz . . . It’s all in what you define as ‘real jazz.’ It happens that to our ears harmony comes first. A dozen colored bands have a better beat than mine. Our band stresses harmony.

If you already have a piece of music ingrained in your body, why would you not play it?

All that I’ve played, all that I’ve sung, I couldn’t have done any other way.

Most people use music as a couch; they want to be pillowed on it, relaxed and consoled for the stress of daily living. But serious music was never meant to be soporific.

Learning to read music in Braille and play by ear helped me develop a damn good memory.

I feel like….Music is the – it’s the answer. It’s the reason.

That’s the thing about jazz: it’s free flowing, it comes from your soul.

Too many jazz pianists limit themselves to a personal style, a trademark, so to speak. They confine themselves to one type of playing. I believe in using the entire piano as a single instrument capable of expressing every possible musical idea. I have no one style. I play as I feel.