Compatible Quotes: Miles Davis

I would go to the library and borrow scores
by all those great composers, like Stravinsky,
Alban Berg, Prokofiev. I wanted to see what
was going on in all of music. Knowledge is
freedom and ignorance is slavery, and I just
couldn’t believe someone could be that close
to freedom and not take advantage of it.

It was because of Bill [Evans]‘s influence, I
think, that I always had classical music on
around the house. It was so soothing to think
and work by. I mean people would come by
and expect to hear a lot of jazz on the box,
but I wasn’t into that at the time and a lot of people
were shocked to hear me listening to classical
music all the time, you know, Stravinsky, Arturo
Michelangeli, Rachmaninoff, Isaac Stern.

I don’t like to hear someone put down dixieland. Those people who say there’s no music but bop are just stupid; it shows how much they don’t know.

You cant play nothing on modern trumpet that doesn’t come from him, (Louis Armstrong) not even modern shit. I can’t even remember a time when he sounded bad playing the trumpet. Never. Not even one time. He had great feeling up in his playing and he always played on the beat. I just loved the way he played and sang

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Photo © Jamie Parslow, 1970