The music has gotten thick. Guys give me tunes and they're full of chords. I can't play them...I think a movement in jazz is beginning away from the conventional string of chords, and a return to emphasis on melodic rather than harmonic variation. There will be fewer chords but infinite possibilities as to what to do with them.

You ever hear Buddy Miles play the drums? You know, he doesn't vary the tempo at all.

I always listen to what I can leave out.

You can tell whether a person plays well or not by the way he carries the instrument, whether it means something to him or not.

I don't like to hear someone put down dixieland. Those people who say there's no music but bop are just stupid; it shows how much they don't know.

If you have a tone like mine that is recognizable. No matter what I play, when you hear my tone you can tell it's me.

When I heard Coleman Hawkins, I learned to play ballads