Cecil Taylor Quotes

The quality of life, values that go down to doin' that, that's the issue.

I try to imitate on the piano the leaps in space a dancer makes.

Rhythm is the life of space of time danced through.

If you take the creation of music and the creation of your own life values as your overall goal, then living becomes a musical process.

Doesn't that fool know I recorded that song because I like it?

You must surrender whatever preconceptions you have about music if you're really interested in it.

To me, the piano in itself is an orchestra.

In short, [Coltrane's] tone is beautiful because it is functional. In other words, it is always involved in saying something. You can't separate the means that a man uses to say something from what he ultimately says. Technique is not separated from its content in a great artist.

Sometimes when it goes really well, you wonder, "who's that at the piano?"

Improvisation is the ability to talk to oneself.

To feel is perhaps the most terrifying thing in this society.

I understand about the relative strengths of people, and I don't think people have to be anything. They can be nothin' if they want to be.

I discovered very early that it wasn't quite enough for me to imitate people.