[Bebop is] Chinese music.
My whole life, my whole soul, my whole spirit is to blow that horn.
If you have to ask what jazz is, you'll never know.
Musicians don't retire; they stop when there's no more music in them.
If I don’t practice for a day, I know it. If I don’t practice for two days, the critics know it. And if I don’t practice for three days, the public knows it.
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