Jazz music is a language of the emotions.

Bach is how buildings got taller. It's how we got to the moon.

Just because I'm playing jazz I don't forget about me. I play or write me, the way I feel, through jazz, or whatever.

Whatever coast he's on, a man should be himself. I don't write in any particular idiom, I write Charles Mingus.

I was born swinging and clapped my hands in church as a little boy, but I've grown up and I like to do things other than just swing. But blues can do more than just swing.

I always thought that no matter what kind of work people did, they should involve themselves totally with all the discrimination they ran into.

Most customers, by the time the musicians reach the second set, are to some extent inebriated. They don't care what you play anyway.