[Bebop is] Chinese music.

It's America's classical music ... this becomes our tradition ... the bottom line of any country in the world is what did we contribute to the world? ... we contributed Louis Armstrong

Jazz is played from the heart. You can even live by it. Always love it.

Not too slow, not too fast. Kind of like half-fast.

The Brick House was one of the toughest joints I ever played in ... Guys would drink and fight one another like circle saws. Bottles would come flying over the bandstand like crazy and there was lots of plain common shooting and cutting. But somehow all that jive didn't faze me at all. I was so happy to have some place to blow my horn.

The way they are treating my people in the South, the government can go to hell!

When you're dead, you're done.