It’s not the note you play that’s the wrong note – it’s the note you play afterwards that makes it right or wrong.
You have to know 400 notes that you can play, then pick the right four.
Americans don’t like any form of art, man. All they like to do is make money. They don’t like me, Sammy Davis, or anybody else. They don’t like nothing. They just like Sammy because he can make ’em a lot of money.
It’s not about standing still and becoming safe. If anybody wants to keep creating they have to be about change.
If you sacrifice your art because of some woman, or some man, or for some color, or for some wealth, you can’t be trusted.
In music, silence is more important than sound.
We don’t play to be seen. I’m addicted to music, not audiences.
Sometimes you have to play a long time to be able to play like yourself.
Knowledge is freedom and ignorance is slavery.
Bebop didn’t have the humanity of Duke Ellington. It didn’t have that recognizable thing. Bird and Diz were great, fantastic, challenging – but that weren’t sweet.
I never thought Jazz was meant to be a museum piece like other dead things once considered artistic.
I’ll play it first and figure out what it’s called later.
If you’re not nervous then you’re not paying attention.
Jazz is the big brother of Revolution. Revolution follows it around.
White folks always think that you have to have a label on everything – you know what I mean?
Good music is good no matter what kind of music it is.
My future starts when I wake up every morning.
If you hit a wrong note, it’s the next note that you play that determines if it’s good or bad.
People will go for anything they don’t understand if it’s got enough hype...
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?