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It's taken me all my life to learn what not to play.

Dizzy Gillespie

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Dizzy Gillespie
Age: 75 †
Born: 1917
Born: October 21
Died: 1993
Died: January 6
Bandleader
Composer
Conductor
Jazz Musician
Musician
Pianist
Recording Artist
Singer
Trumpeter
Cheraw
South Carolina
John Birks Gillespie
John Birks Dizzy Gillespie
Play
Life
Jazz
Musical
Musician
Taken
Learn
Music

More quotes by Dizzy Gillespie

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I used to do a lot of apologizing for what the State Department had done.
Dizzy Gillespie
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We loved one another, man. I mean all those stories about the rift ... there was no question of a rift between Charlie Parker and me.
Dizzy Gillespie
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I try to play the bare essence, to let everything be just what it's supposed to be in that particular spot...You have many things to pick from when you're playing, so you try to train yourself to pick out the best things that you know.
Dizzy Gillespie
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How do I know why Miles walks off the stage? Why don't you ask him? And besides, maybe we'd all like to be like Miles, and just haven't got the guts.
Dizzy Gillespie
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Kenny Burrell is the grand master of jazz guitar.
Dizzy Gillespie
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They're not particular whether you're playing a flat 5th or a ruptured 129th as long as they can dance.
Dizzy Gillespie
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I don't care much about music. What I like is sounds.
Dizzy Gillespie
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As a musician you have to keep one foot back in the past and have one foot forward into the future.
Dizzy Gillespie
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When I grow up I want to be just like Benny Carter!
Dizzy Gillespie
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Some days you get up and put the horn to your chops and it sounds pretty good and you win. Some days you try and nothing works and the horn wins. This goes on and on and then you die and the horn wins.
Dizzy Gillespie
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There have been two great revelations in my life: The first was bepop, the second was homeopathy.
Dizzy Gillespie
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The sign of a mature musician is knowing what not to play.
Dizzy Gillespie
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The idea of life is to give and receive.
Dizzy Gillespie
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Bop is at the end of the road. Now everybody wants dance music.
Dizzy Gillespie
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I try to play the bare essence, to let everything be just what it's supposed to be.
Dizzy Gillespie
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You can't steal a gift. Bird [Charlie Parker] gave the world his music, and if you can hear it you can have it.
Dizzy Gillespie
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Nothing surpasses my performances with small bands, especially with Charlie Parker. A small band doesn't forestall creativity.
Dizzy Gillespie
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I'd like to play for you one of my compositions, my only composition.
Dizzy Gillespie
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Thank you, ladies and gentlemen, for your magnificent indifference.
Dizzy Gillespie