Nat King Cole

Music is emotional, and you may catch a musician in a very unemotional mood or you may not be in the same frame of mind as the musician. So a critic will often say a musician is slipping.

I’m not playing for other musicians. We’re trying to reach the guy who works all day and wants to spend a buck at night. We’ll keep him happy.

I often wonder whether Negroes like myself who are pretty well known help out at all in breaking down barriers.

I’m an interpreter of stories. When I perform it’s like sitting down at my piano and telling fairy stories.

I am an American citizen and feel I am entitled to the same rights as any other citizen.

I started out to become a jazz pianist; in the meantime I started singing and I sang the way I felt and that’s just the way it came out.

I guess what everyone wants more than anything else is to be loved. And to know that you loved me for my singing is too much for me. Forgive me if I don’t have all the words. Maybe I can sing it and you’ll understand.

Just ’cause I’ve forgotten more than I can play, doesn’t mean it’s not Improv.

I want the music to connect to people; reach people every time I perform.

I don’t need words. It’s all in the phrasing.

Monk encouraged me to emancipate the drums from their subservient role as timekeepers.

Jazz goes into my coffee in the morning, in my wine at night.

By and large Jazz has always been like the kind of a man you wouldn’t want your daughter to associate with.

A guy is influenced by hundreds of people and things, and all show up in his work. To fasten on any one or two is ridiculous. I will say one thing, though. Lennie Tristano’s early records impressed me tremendously. Tunes like ‘Tautology,’ ‘Marshmallow,’ and ‘Fishin’ Around.’ I heard the fellows in his group building their lines with a design and general structure that was different from anything I’d ever heard in jazz.

It bugs me when people try to analyze Jazz as an intellectual theorem. It’s not, it’s feeling.

When Bird came on the scene, it was shocking as in the Bible: everything was dark and then there was light.

Well if I could play like Wynton Marsalis, I wouldn’t play like Wynton.

I worked hard learning harmony and theory when I was growing up in Chicago in the 1920s.

The whole concept for the Yeezus album is that we’re not going to be using CDs in the future and since this is the last time we’re going to see it, this is an open casket for the CD.

My singing evolved with a feeling of intense relaxation, always using my diaphram and breathing specifically through my nose.

It’s up to the individual to keep up with the times.