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Monk taught me more about music composition than anyone else on 52nd Street.

Miles Davis

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Miles Davis
Age: 65 †
Born: 1926
Born: May 26
Died: 1991
Died: September 28
Actor
Autobiographer
Bandleader
Composer
Conductor
Film Score Composer
Jazz Musician
Musician
Recording Artist
Songwriter
Television Actor
Alton
Illinois
Miles Dewey Davis III
Miles Dewey Davis
III Davis
Streets
Taught
Anyone
Else
Monk
Music
Composition
Jazz
Street
Musical

More quotes by Miles Davis

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Somebody, my daughter or my wife, gave me a music box for Christmas. It plays My Funny Valentine on celeste, you know? So I had Bobby [Irving] just play Jean Pierre with the changes on celeste.
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I know what I've done for music, but don't call me a legend. Just call me Miles Davis.
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That's the way you judge a car, man, [good or bad], when you start it up. It's just the same thing. I mean, I drive a Ferrari - not to be cute, but because I dig it. I'd rather drive a ten-year-old Ferrari than one of them new things-they don't go.
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Lionel [Richie] said, Yeah, I learned chords and stuff playin' against your albums.
Miles Davis
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I used to enjoy all the white bands when I was a kid listening to the radio. But the record companies, they take music and label it - like, they say rock. Because the white singers can't sound like James Brown, they call him soul. They've been doing that for years. That's the prejudice crap.
Miles Davis
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Don't worry about playing a lot of notes. Just find one pretty one.
Miles Davis
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People will go for anything they don't understand if it's got enough hype.
Miles Davis
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I really liked Wynton when I first met him. He's still a nice young man, only confused.
Miles Davis
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Maybe you play a melody twice. You play it once like you like it, and some parts that you don't like you can just switch. An eight-bar motive - you can just take it and put it in the front or back or something like that. It can save you 50 or 60 or 70,000 dollars, a drum machine. That's why everybody uses it.
Miles Davis
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When we edit the music, I always remember, It's my band. Save me a place to play.
Miles Davis
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When you work with great musicians, they are always a part of you . . . their spirits are walking around in me, so they're still here and passing it on to others.
Miles Davis
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There are no wrong notes.
Miles Davis
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Catch Harry Belafonte. He's got a helluva rhythm section.And so have the Pointer Sisters. And that little guy with Sammy Clayton. He plays the whole show with 40 members.
Miles Davis
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If I hear a song like Time After Time. I'm sittin' there lookin' at video and Cindy Lauper comes on singin' this song. I said, God damnnnnn!
Miles Davis
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I keep telling Ron Lorman and them in the control room, It's my band! The reason I have a band is because I can't stand for somebody to tell me what to do.
Miles Davis
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If you have a tone like mine that is recognizable. No matter what I play, when you hear my tone you can tell it's me.
Miles Davis
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If you have to ask, you'll never know.
Miles Davis
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You can't play anything on a horn that Louis Armstrong hasn't played
Miles Davis
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Bebop didn't have the humanity of Duke Ellington. It didn't even have that recognizable thing. Bird and Diz were great, fantastic, challenging — but they weren't sweet.
Miles Davis
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Everybody ought to listen to Benny [Carter]. He's a whole musical education.
Miles Davis