Jimmy Smith Quotes

They would come down in Mississippi, they hired me as a talent scout. And I would go all over Mississippi, Alabama, Texas, and find out different artists for them.

I'd actually been making my living as an organist with bands since I was probably 15 or 16 years old, and then as a senior in high school I put together a jazz quintet called The Bobby Mack Jazz Quintet.

I was actually discovered by Kai Millard and Stevie Wonder.

I wasn't a trained Mickey Mouse club performer. I played in jazz clubs and restaurants.

I was signed to A&M, I was signed to Lou Adler, who had a company within a company, which was A&M Records, and everything - James Taylor, Rita Coolidge, Carole King - I worked on all of that stuff.

I had no idea what awaited me when I took a job with CBS Records, and it was a total surprise to find I had a gift and an ear for music.

In 1994, I started touring again and I recorded two albums for Chesky Jazz.

I went with Lionel Hampton for three years. Out of that came a trip to Europe.

He asked my girlfriend if we could come over and sing some of the songs that we had written, which we did. After he heard the songs, he said that he knew someone in the record business by the name of Bob Shad.

Long made it possible for me to get on records, so what little money he did take from me, if any at all, he was entitled to it. He didn't take something from me.

I grew up with Al Jarreau. We had a band together and worked these places for three years when neither one of us knew we could make a living doing music.

Miles Davis had me play and he hired me the following week and after that, everything broke wide open.

Miles Davis was a part of my life from 1947 on. I was born in 1941 and I first heard him in 1947 on a 78 rpm. And then I followed his career, starting with his first solo album in 1951. He was an icon and inspiration and a mentor to me.

People always said that I hated punk, and that really wasn't true. It was glossed over for many years that I was the guy who found the Tubes and signed them to A&M. English punk was a revolution.

Columbia was a wonderful label for me. Wonderful. The records I made there garnered me an audience. I won a number of polls during the years that I was at Columbia. The Downbeat Jazz Poll. Leonard Feather, who was a huge critic back in the day, different polls that he had. The Playboy poll, a number of polls. So the music was great.

I came to California and got signed at a young age. And it's not like you see in the movies, where you start rubbing shoulders with Timbaland and Pharrell, and you become a giant pop star.

My first album is like a terrible John Hammond album, with drums.

I knew that it was my only shot to be taken seriously in the recording industry, because it's fast and broad.

Even though I left for a year, I grew here as a Jazz man. If I'm fortunate enough to go into the Hall of Fame, I will go as a Jazz man.

I went to Juilliard in New York and used to do cabarets just for fun. Occasionally, I would get together with a jazz musician and play at a restaurant for cash. And I've done some background vocals for recording artists.

My brother had a big band in high school; after that we continued to play together, eventually forming a group called the Jazz Brothers, that recorded for Riverside Records.

I am a singer first and foremost. I was lucky enough to have a manager, when I was 15, who knew the heads of a lot of record labels at the time.

When I first heard Ray Charles, he was a flop artist on a small label in California. He hadn't sold any records. And I bought his contract for $2,500.

I was a jazz drummer, and it was my life for a while: what I lived and breathed every day.

It was probably when I met Jeff Hamilton, the drummer I've been working with for the last 20 years. He's the one who brought Ray Brown to hear me sing at a restaurant in my hometown.