You hear about the Duke Ellingtons, the Jimmie Luncefords, and the Fletcher Hendersons, but people sometimes forget that jazz was not only built in the minds of the great ones, but on the backs of the ordinary ones.

Everybody came. Everybody came to the Cotton Club.

People sometimes forget that jazz was built not only in the minds of the great ones but on the backs of the ordinary ones — ordinary musicians.

A phoenix ain't nuthin' but a burd.

It's very difficult to photograph an opera. And they messed up on it. It just wasn't there. And I don't blame the Gershwins for taking it away. Of course, if they had gotten the original company to have done it, it would have been very good

What opera isn't violent? Two things happen, violence and love. And other than that, name something else. You can't

You don't think it was because a white man wrote it, a black man wrote it, a green man wrote it. What-doesn't make a difference!