Oscar Peterson

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.

I play as I feel.

If you have something to say of any worth then people will listen to you.

I don’t believe that a lot of the things I hear on the air today are going to be played for as long a time as Coleman Hawkins records or Brahms concertos.

You not only have to know your own instrument, you must know the others and how to back them up at all times. That’s jazz.

I don’t do something because I think it’ll sell 30 million albums. I couldn’t care less if it sells just one.

Joe’s been my drummer for 14 years, and we’ve been buddies for six years.

I like chords that are very lush with all the lush parts taken out.

A movie and a stage show are two entirely different things. A picture, you can do anything you want. Change it, cut out a scene, put in a scene, take a scene out. They don’t do that on stage.

In Jazz, improvisation isn’t a matter of just making any ol’ thing up. Jazz, like any language, has its own grammer and vocabulary. There’s no right or wrong, just some choices that are better than others.

I want to create music that’s therapeutic.

Just to keep it interesting I’ll tune the guitar randomly, so I don’t know what’s going to come out.

Without jazz, life would be a mistake.

If you’re going to make a mistake, make it loud so everybody else sounds wrong.

If you want to be a musician, study your craft. Study music.

Somebody asked me once, ‘Do you think that swing will ever come back?’ And I said, ‘Do you think the 1938 Form will ever come back?’

I’m not much on gimmicks. I never have been because they don’t last.

True Jazz lovers understand the rhythms are infectious because they are the roots.

I thought of nothing else but rock ‘n’ roll; apart from sex and food and money–but that’s all the same thing, really.

The main thing is you want to emote.

If you don’t live it, it won’t come out of your horn.