A lot of people ask me where music is going today. I think it's going in short phrases. If you listen, anybody with an ear can hear that. Music is always changing. It changes because of the times and the technology that's available, the material that things are made of, like plastic cars instead of steel. So when you hear an accident today it sounds different, not all the metal colliding like it was in the forties and fifties. Musicians pick up sounds and incorporate that into their playing, so the music that they make will be different.

We're not going to play the blues anymore. Let the white folks play the blues. They got 'em, so they can keep 'em.

There are no wrong notes in jazz: only notes in the wrong places.

If you're trying to be hip, be hip.

As long as I've been playing, they never say I done anything. They always say that some white guy did it.

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

Jazz is the big brother of Revolution. Revolution follows it around.