What do you think happens to a composer who is sincere and loves to write and has to wait thirty years to have someone play a piece of his music?

Creativity is more than just being different. Anybody can plan weird; that's easy. What's hard is to be as simple as Bach. Making the simple, awesomely simple, that's creativity.

Making the simple complicated is commonplace; making the complicated simple, awesomely simple, that's creativity.

I never heard my music played the way I heard it in my head.

I am Charles Mingus, half black man, not even white enough to pass for nothing but black. I am Charles Mingus, a famed jazzman, but not famed enough to make a living in this society.

I'm trying to play the truth of what I am. The reason it's difficult is because I'm changing all the time.

My music is evidence of my souls will to live.

If Charlie Parker were a Gunslinger, There'd be a Whole Lot of Dead Copycats

Jazz music is a language of the emotions.

Making the complicated simple is true creativity.

Bach is how buildings got taller. It's how we got to the moon.

If you want to conquer fear then you have to put fear on your fears.

Ambition is enthusiasm with a purpose.

What we are going to offer is not a one-way communication, but one-to-one communication.

I remember when my father passed away, we drove the funeral procession past the bank so he could say one last goodbye. That's how much the bank meant to my father.

Ski boots are the worst. Solid plastic. They'll be around till the sun goes supernova.

Truth is rare fruit in garden of murder.

Hope gives the heart wings; the soul, an anchor.

Creative leaders inherently know when rules need to be challenged, and they can see when a more flexible approach should be taken.

Big rocks are envy of little sands because little sands can travel with the winds. Every littleness has its own big advantages!

Do you really expect me to say gravity hasn't taken its toll? No. But as I'm earning these lines [in my face], I'm making an aesthetic choice.