Quote

You can't play anything on a horn that Louis Armstrong hasn't played

Miles Davis

Change background

T
T
T

Change font

TAGS & TOPICS

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
Anything
Music
Play
Horn
Armstrong
Louis
Horns
Hasn
Played

More quotes by Miles Davis

Image
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
Image
It took me twenty years study and practice to work up to what I wanted to play in this performance. How can she expect to listen five minutes and understand it?
Miles Davis
Image
I would never try and play like Harry James, because I don't like his tone - for me. It's just white. You know what I mean? He has what we black trumpet players call a white sound. But it's for white music ... I can tell a white trumpet player, just listening to a record. There'll be something he'll do that'll let me know that he's white.
Miles Davis
Image
Some musicians play with their heart, you know what I mean? I don't know what to tell a person that can't - if you can't tell a person what you're talkin' about when they're rushin' or droppin' the tempo, you get somebody else.
Miles Davis
Image
My ego only needs a good rhythm section
Miles Davis
Image
You have to know 400 notes that you can play, then pick the right four.
Miles Davis
Image
My father's rich, my momma's good looking. Right? And I can play the Blues. I've never suffered and don't intend to suffer.
Miles Davis
Image
If you got up on the bandstand at Minton's and couldn't play, you were not only going to be embarrassed by the people ignoring you or booing you, you might get your ass kicked.
Miles Davis
Image
Japanese people they hear my warmin' up and they start screamin'. They can tell it's me.It's my tone on the trumpet, it sounds like I'm speakin'.
Miles Davis
Image
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
Image
I can hear what I want [people] to play. If you don't hear what you want someone to play, then you can't tell 'em.
Miles Davis
Image
I gave the album [You're Under Arrest] to Quincy Jones and he loved D Train. We couldn't call it D Train it's called MDI/Something's On Your Mind/MD2. That's on the album.
Miles Davis
Image
Do not fear mistakes. There are none.
Miles Davis
Image
If you don't know what to play, play nothing.
Miles Davis
Image
Food makes my mind sluggish.
Miles Davis
Image
You want to know how I started playing trumpet? My father bought me one, and I studied the trumpet. And everybody I heard that I liked, I picked up things from.
Miles Davis
Image
In improvisation, there are no mistakes.
Miles Davis
Image
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
Image
I began to realize that some of the things Ornette Coleman had said about things being played three or fours ways, independently of each other, were true because Bach had also composed that way.
Miles Davis
Image
You know why I quit playing ballads? Cause I love playing ballads.
Miles Davis