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If youre going to use standards as criteria for signing musicians, you can sign thousands. If youre going to use some sort of conceptual interpretation thats based on the tradition of those standards, but is trying to move away from it, youre down to about 10 people or so.

Branford Marsalis

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Branford Marsalis
Age: 64
Born: 1960
Born: August 26
Actor
Composer
Jazz Musician
Saxophonist
New Orleans
Louisiana
Trying
Standards
Signing
Going
Tradition
Thats
People
Based
Criteria
Move
Musicians
Sort
Interpretation
Moving
Thousands
Use
Sign
Away
Musician
Conceptual

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I gave up my base in popular culture when I left the Tonight Show.
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We played it as long as we could play it on that CD and I think it might be 50 minutes, maybe. What you have to do is play a couple of songs and then get off the stage because everything that trails it sounds stupid.
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I don't care who likes it or buys it. Because if you use that criterion, Mozart would have never written Don Giovanni, Charlie Parker never would have played anything but swing music. There comes a point at which you have to stand up and say, this is what I have to do.
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A lot of musicians have a tough time hearing what we're doing in a trio format.
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You hear it in your brain. Whatever makes sense. Some songs work well as quartet songs, sometimes they don't.
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If you listen to a lot of the songs that are popular now, there's very little melody in there. People love the beat. But to musicians, it's melody, because we understand how elusive it is and how hard it is to hold.
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When you're dealing with music without words, titles are more a means of identification than anything else. What's the point of getting lofty?
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That's kind of like how jazz is sometimes. You're out there predicting the future, and no one believes you.
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It's something that jazz has gotten away from, and it's unfortunate. Players aren't physical anymore.
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Jazz is so incestuous that it's starting to kill itself.
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We all played bad before we played good.
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My job is to write songs that have emotional meaning to me.
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The piano is the X factor. People have a tough time following the structures when there's no piano there, spelling it out. It makes it more easily understood, particularly to people who don't know as much about music.
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What is jazz? It, It's almost like asking, What is French? Jazz is a musical language. It's a musical dialect that actually embodies the spirit of America.
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If it's not going to sound like Terrapin Station, what's the point of playing Terrapin Station?
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The biggest problem with American music right now, is that kids don't listen. They come by it honestly, Americans don't listen anyway. When people go to concerts, they say I'm going to see... not, I'm going to hear.
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The way to learn the language is to rip off other players. As Benny Golson told me, We all start off sounding like other cats. And gradually, a lick here or there,we start to sound like ourselves. But it takes a long time to do so... That'swhat he told me, and it worked for me.
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Everybody talks about finding your voice. Do your homework and your voice will find you.
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It's hard to get into Newsweek because, as more of our former intellectual magazines take on a pop focus, if there's no buzz, there's no interest.
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The whole point is, give me a break with the standards. You go to the average jazz label and suggest a record and they want to know which standards you're going to play. I'm saying let's break the formula.
Branford Marsalis