We always hear about the rights of democracy, but the major responsibility of it is participation.
Wynton MarsalisWe fight for territory. We see it in our Congress, we see it in our political systems, we see it in our ways of life, how separated we are. When we moved out of the cities and we lost all of the memory that was in cities, and we - one of the highest achievements in our culture is to be able to segregate yourself from everyone else, and the deep thing is the deepest punishment is solitary confinement.
Wynton MarsalisWhat I really have in my head, my imagination, my understanding of music, I never really get that out.
Wynton MarsalisEven in these times, there are still neighbors that will turn their backs on neighbors.
Wynton MarsalisI think that when the education system started to be dismantled during the first Great Depression in the 1930s, we didn't recover from that.
Wynton MarsalisWhat takes its place is very dry education. And the tools that actually can teach you - singing and playing, learning how to participate with other people, spiritual richness - are replaced with a big emphasis on how to memorize things. That's such an incomplete education. Survival of the fittest used to mean being bigger and stronger.
Wynton Marsalis