Man, that cat [Ornette Coleman] is nuts.

Jazz is freedom. You think about that.

— Thelonious Monk

A note can be as small as a pin or as big as the world, it depends on your imagination.

— Thelonious Monk

I was being ridiculed for going to school... But, you see, I had looked hard at the other musicians and the whole show-business scene...…

— Donald Byrd

I don't dig that two-beat jive the New Orleans cats play. My boys and I have to have four heavy beats to the bar…

— Count Basie

The bad jazz that a cat blows wails long after he’s cut out.

— Lord Buckley

At this time the fashion is to bring something to jazz that I reject. They speak of freedom. But one has no right, under…

— Thelonious Monk

I say, play your own way. Don't play what the public want - you play what you want and let the public pick up…

— Thelonious Monk

I don't have a definition of Jazz. You're just supposed to know it when you hear it.

— Thelonious Monk

I'm a jazz musician by education and vocation, but I don't think jazz should [ dictate] what I want to do.

— Dave Douglas

The reward for playing jazz is playing jazz.

— John Lewis

Jazz music just resonates with the frequency of me.

— Esperanza Spalding

Truth of the matter is, jazz is American music. And that doesn't mean bebop. Jazz is really about improvising. All the music that's been…

— Jaimoe

I just love all the music. My grandma was a church organist for 40 years, and she got me into jazz music and great…

— Zach Anner

Jazz is the music of the body. The breath comes through brass. It is the body's breath, and the strings' wails and moans are…

— Anais Nin

Growing up in Iceland, it was very beautiful, very safe, but quite isolated. There was something about jazz music that had a way of…

— Laufey