Quote

If you have a great band with a mediocre drummer, you have a mediocre band. If you have a mediocre band with a great drummer, you have a great band!

Duke Ellington

Change background

T
T
T

Change font

TAGS & TOPICS

Duke Ellington
Age: 75 †
Born: 1899
Born: April 29
Died: 1974
Died: May 24
Autobiographer
Bandleader
Composer
Conductor
Film Score Composer
Jazz Arranger
Jazz Musician
Lyricist
Music Arranger
Musician
Pianist
Washington
District of Columbia
Edward Kennedy Duke Ellington
Edward Kennedy Ellington
Edward K. Ellington
Drummer
Mediocre
Band
Great

More quotes by Duke Ellington

Image
A musical profit outweighs a financial loss.
Duke Ellington
Image
Everybody in Canada seemed to listen to what they enjoyed, and nobody could tell them what to like, or what was the popular, or what was the In thing. Even today, it is very hard to brainwash a Canadian.
Duke Ellington
Image
On becoming more acquainted with the word of the Bible, I began to understand so much more of what I had been taught, and of what I had learned about life and about the people in mine.
Duke Ellington
Image
Without a deadline, baby, I wouldn't do nothing.
Duke Ellington
Image
Billy Strayhorn was my right arm, my left arm, all the eyes in the back of my head, my brainwaves in his head, and his in mine.
Duke Ellington
Image
Self-discipline, as a virtue or an acquired asset, can be invaluable to anyone.
Duke Ellington
Image
The wise musicians are those who play what they can master.
Duke Ellington
Image
Somehow I suspect that if Shakespeare were alive today, he might be a jazz fan himself.
Duke Ellington
Image
Love is supreme and unconditional like is nice but limited.
Duke Ellington
Image
Jazz today, as always in the past, is a matter of thoughtful creation, not mere unaided instinct.
Duke Ellington
Image
My biggest kick in music -playing or writing- is when I have a problem. Without a problem to solve, how much interest do you take in anything?
Duke Ellington
Image
The common root, of course, comes out of Africa. That's the pulse.The African pulse. It's all the way back from . . . the old slave chants and up through the blues, the jazz, and up through rock. And it's all got the African pulse.
Duke Ellington
Image
The Europeans who went to Africa came back with “modern' art. What is more African than a Picasso?
Duke Ellington
Image
There are two kinds of worries - those you can do something about and those you can't. Don't spend any time on the latter.
Duke Ellington
Image
What does music mean to you? What would you do without music?
Duke Ellington
Image
I don’t believe in categories of any kind, and when you speak of problems between blacks and whites in the U.S.A. you are referring to categories again.
Duke Ellington
Image
There is hardly any money interest in art, and music will be there when money is gone.
Duke Ellington
Image
The word [jazz] never lost its association with those New Orleans bordellos. In the 1920s I used to try to convince Fletcher Henderson that we ought to call what we were doing 'Negro music'. But it's too late for that now.
Duke Ellington
Image
Love is indescribable and unconditional. I could tell you a thousand things that it is not, but not one that it is. Either you have it or you haven't there's no proof of it.
Duke Ellington
Image
Music is my mistress and she plays second fiddle to no one.
Duke Ellington