You have to stop listening in categories. The music is either good or it's bad. — Duke Ellington Copy Share Image
Playing 'bop' is like playing Scrabble with all the vowels missing. — Duke Ellington Copy Share Image
Self-discipline, as a virtue or an acquired asset, can be invaluable to anyone. — Duke Ellington Copy Share Image
Critics get a little carried away with what someone should have done, rather than what he did. — Duke Ellington Copy Share Image
The most important thing I look for in a musician is whether he knows how to listen. — Duke Ellington Copy Share Image
There is hardly any money interest in art, and music will be there when money is gone. — Duke Ellington Copy Share Image
I never had much interest in the piano until I realized that every time I played, a girl would appear on the… — Duke Ellington Copy Share Image
If anybody was Mr. Jazz it was Louis Armstrong. He was the epitome of jazz and always will be. He is what… — Duke Ellington Copy Share Image
The problem of expressing the contributions that Benny Carter has made to popular music is so tremendous it completely fazes me, so… — Duke Ellington Copy Share Image
Dancing is very important to people who play music with a beat. I think that people who don't dance, or who never… — Duke Ellington Copy Share Image
I'm sure critics have their purpose, and they're supposed to do what they do, but sometimes they get a little carried away… — Duke Ellington Copy Share Image
I like any and all of my associations with music -writing, playing, and listening. We write and play from our perspective, and… — Duke Ellington Copy Share Image
I began by tinkering around with some old tunes I knew. Then, just to try something different, I set to putting some… — Duke Ellington Copy Share Image
Roaming through the jungle of "Ohs" and "Ahs" searching for a more agreeable noise, I live a life of primitivity with the… — Duke Ellington Copy Share Image
Love is indescribable and unconditional. I could tell you a thousand things that it is not, but not one that it is.… — Duke Ellington Copy Share Image
If anybody was Mr. Jazz it was Louis Armstrong. He was the epitome of jazz and always will be. He is what… — Duke Ellington Copy Share Image
In music, as you develop a theme or musical idea, there are many points at which directions must be decided, and at… — Duke Ellington Copy Share Image
Put it this way: Jazz is a good barometer of freedom... In its beginnings, the United States of America spawned certain ideals… — Duke Ellington Copy Share Image
There is nothing to keeping a band together. You simply have to have a gimmick, and the gimmick I use is to… — Duke Ellington Copy Share Image
Music, of course, is what I hear and something that I more or less live by. It's not an occupation or profession,… — Duke Ellington Copy Share Image
“You can’t write music right unless you know how the man that’ll play it plays poker.” — Duke Ellington Copy Share Image
My biggest kick in music -playing or writing- is when I have a problem. Without a problem to solve, how much interest… — Duke Ellington Copy Share Image
It is becoming increasingly difficult to decide where jazz starts or where it stops, where Tin Pan Alley begins and jazz ends,… — Duke Ellington Copy Share Image
There are simply two kinds of music, good music and the other kind ... the only yardstick by which the result should… — Duke Ellington Copy Share Image
Jazz today, as always in the past, is a matter of thoughtful creation, not mere unaided instinct. — Duke Ellington Copy Share Image
The most important thing I look for in a musician is whether he knows how to listen. — Duke Ellington Copy Share Image
The common root, of course, comes out of Africa. That's the pulse.The African pulse. It's all the way back from . . . the… — Duke Ellington Copy Share Image
The problem of expressing the contributions that Benny Carter has made to popular music is so tremendous it completely fazes me, so extraordinary a… — Duke Ellington Copy Share Image
If anybody was Mr. Jazz it was Louis Armstrong. He was the epitome of jazz and always will be. He is what I call… — Duke Ellington Copy Share Image
