Stan Getz

Life is too full of distractions nowadays. When I was a kid we had a little Emerson radio and that was it. We were more dedicated. We didn’t have a choice.

I played in rhumba bands, mickey mouse bands; all kinds of bands.

I cannot play a lie. I have to believe in what I play or it won’t come out.

We recorded to document ourselves, not to sell a lot of records.

Musically, I love to talk just off the top of my head and that’s what Jazz is all about.

I learn something new every day.

For me, the most important thing is the element of chance that is built into a live performance. The very great drawback of recorded sound is the fact that it is always the same. No matter how wonderful a recording is, I know that I couldn’t live with it–even of my own music–with the same nuances forever.

It’s like a language. You learn the alphabet, which are the scales. You learn sentences, which are the chords. And then you talk extemporaneously with the horn. It’s a wonderful thing to speak extemporaneously, which is something I’ve never gotten the hang of. But musically I love to talk just off the top of my head. And that’s what jazz music is all about.

Hell is full of musical amateurs.

Jazz is the continual pulsation of the now.

Other than conversation, no other art form can give the satisfaction of spontaneous interaction like Jazz.

Critics get a little carried away with what someone should have done, rather than what he did.

[In 1969] I think lyrics have always been important to any serious writer of music.

Jazz can only enhance the Classical side and Classical can only enhance the Jazz side.

I’m going to be on the road for the rest of my life.

There’s a sadness to all kinds of music if you want to hear it. There’s also happiness to it if you want to hear it.

We all played bad before we played good.

Jazz music grabs you to the point where it never lets you go until the very last breath.

Technique is the ability to translate your ideas into sound through your instrument.

No one is original. Everyone is derivative.

The more vulnerable and the more confused the song is, the equal and opposite effect is how I feel after having written it.