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I believe in professionalism, but playing is not like a job. You have to be grateful to have the opportunity to play.

Wynton Marsalis

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Wynton Marsalis
Age: 63
Born: 1961
Born: October 18
Bandleader
Composer
Conductor
Jazz Musician
Trumpeter
New Orleans
Louisiana
Wynton Learson Marsalis
Professionalism
Grateful
Playing
Opportunity
Jobs
Play
Believe
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More quotes by Wynton Marsalis

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If you want to be different, do something different.
Wynton Marsalis
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This is our bandstand. If you don't want to play, get up off the instrument and leave.
Wynton Marsalis
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The nerves are a problem on trumpet, because when you mess up everyone can hear it. Just remember most people are too polite to say anything about it. That should calm your nerves.
Wynton Marsalis
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You don't try to duplicate certain things that other cats do, because you could never do it as well as they do. Nobody can get on that tenor saxophone and play like Trane, because he's the only one who can spell out chords and sound good when he does it.
Wynton Marsalis
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When I first came to New York everybody on the scene would treat me like I could play but I couldn't.
Wynton Marsalis
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Louis Armstrong is jazz. He represents what the music is all about.
Wynton Marsalis
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I almost never watch TV, except for '60 Minutes' and pro football. I love Drew Brees, the Manning brothers and the Steelers' linebackers.
Wynton Marsalis
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When did we begin to lose faith in our ability to effect change?
Wynton Marsalis
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The soul gives us resilience - an essential quality since we constantly have to rebound from hardship.
Wynton Marsalis
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My thing is, once you start to put a backbeat on your music or something that has a machine in it, you have popularity, but you lose the flexibility. And you lose a richness.
Wynton Marsalis
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I think that virtuosity is the first sign of morality in a musician. It means you're serious enough to practice.
Wynton Marsalis
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I feel like a lot of the fundamental material, I've assimilated. So now the question is: Am I going to really get into my spiritual inheritance of music and really develop my abilities?
Wynton Marsalis
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This rebuilding of New Orleans gives us the perfect opportunity to see if we're ready to extend the legacy of Dr. King.
Wynton Marsalis
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Everything comes out in blues music: joy, pain, struggle. Blues is affirmation with absolute elegance. It's about a man and a woman. So the pain and the struggle in the blues is that universal pain that comes from having your heart broken. Most blues songs are not about social statements.
Wynton Marsalis
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Flexibility is an essential part of Jazz. It's what gives Jazz music the ability to combine with all other types of music and not lose its identity.
Wynton Marsalis
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When I auditioned for my high school band the band director was excited because my father was known to be a great musician. When he heard me, he said 'Are you sure you're Ellis's son?'
Wynton Marsalis
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The Duke and Swing represent affirmation in the face of adversity.
Wynton Marsalis
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The best way to be, is to do.
Wynton Marsalis
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What is deeper than respect and love? That’s what we felt: veneration.
Wynton Marsalis
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We learn a language through its song, and even if you don't have music you have the song of people you love's voice, and you'll notice that song in their voice.
Wynton Marsalis