So What or Kind of Blue were done in that era, the right hour, the right day. It's over; it's on the record.

Anybody can play. The note is only 20 percent. The attitude of the motherfucker who plays it is 80 percent.

It's not the note you play that's the wrong note - it's the note you play afterwards that makes it right or wrong.

If somebody told me I only had an hour to live, I'd spend it choking a white man. I'd do it nice and slow.

It's not about standing still and becoming safe. If anybody wants to keep creating they have to be about change.

In music, silence is more important than sound.

I'm always thinking about creating. My future starts when I wake up every morning... Every day I find something creative to do with my life.

Knowledge is freedom and ignorance is slavery

Do not fear mistakes. There are none.

Sometimes you have to play a long time to be able to play like yourself.

If you sacrifice your art because of some woman, or some man, or for some color, or for some wealth, you can't be trusted.

I suppose the secret of his success is in his tremendous idleness which almost approaches the supernatural.

The maxim, "Nothing prevails but perfection, " may be spelled PARALYSIS.

Practice puts brains in your muscles.

One of the main things that's appealing about games is that you know a game can be won. It's an unusual game that's impossible to win.

If you find someone who agrees with you 80 percent of the time that is your friend not your enemy.

A mother would never by choice sleep in a wet bed but she would gladly do so in order to spare the dry bed for her child.

Winter invites white; white invites silence; silence invites peace. You see, there is so much peace in walking on the snow!

When we meet a person truly in need, do we see the face of God?

There is always hazard in military activity, but we must decide between the positive loss of inactivity and the risk of action.

I don't believe that shamanism without hallucinogens is authentic shamanism or comfortable shamanism.