With a guitar I would be able to express the things I felt in sounds.

Life is like a trumpet - if you don't put anything into it, you don't get anything out of it.

A lean, loose-jointed Negro had commenced plunking a guitar beside me while I slept. His clothes were rags; his feet peeped out of his shoes. His face had on it some of the sadness of the ages. As he played, he pressed a knife on the strings of the guitar in a manner popularized by Hawaiian guitarists who used steel bars. The effect was unforgettable.

With a guitar I would be able to express the things I felt in sounds.

You've got to appreciate the things that come from the art of the Negro and from the heart of the man farthest down.

You'll never miss the water 'til the well runs dry.

I think America concedes that true American music has sprung from the Negro.