Stan Getz Quotes

If there's one thing I feel very strongly about, it's that there shouldn't be a distinction between pianists who play Ligeti and those who play Chopin. It might seem that they involve different skill sets, but I don't think that's true: whether playing Ives or Bach or Beethoven, you must bring the same imagination, the same sensitivity, and an ability to deal with same kinds of musical problems. The method behind my madness, anyway, is to keep plugging away at this idea.

Endeavour to play easy pieces well and with elegance; that is better than to play difficult pieces badly.

I like Stan [Getz], because he has so much patience, the way he plays those melodies - other people can't get nothing out of a song, but he can, which takes a lot of imagination.

People err who think my art comes easily to me. I assure you, dear friend, nobody has devoted so much time and thought to compositions as I. There is not a famous master whose music I have not industriously studied through many times.

I had decided that if I was going to be a singer, I had to earn it. I had to learn how to play an instrument.

Frank's bands could play the hardest stuff and make it seem like no big deal.

I worked extremely hard at my craft and at being a good songwriter, being a good guitar player, being a good organist, because I didn't think people would take me seriously.

One does not play the piano with one's fingers: one plays the piano with one's mind.

People think that singing and playing is easy. It's not. It's easy to strum along, but if you actually want to really play, where it's important, that's a hard thing and not too many people are good at it.

You can't learn to play the piano without playing the piano, you can't learn to write without writing, and, in many ways, you can't learn to think without thinking. Writing is thinking. To write well is to think clearly. That's why it's so hard.

He(C. Ronaldo) makes the most difficult plays look easy.

It seems to me that most people are impressed with just three things: how fast you can play, how high you can play, and how loud you can play.

We all want to play great music all the time, but if that is not possible, you have to hit as many right notes as you can.

What one has most to work and struggle for in painting is to do the work with a great amount of labour and sweat in such a way that it may afterward appear, however much it was laboured upon, to have been done almost quickly and almost without any labour, and very easily, although it was not.

Like I say, it depends on how you do rock-'n'-roll. If you do it right then I think people will appreciate it for what it is.

I think you get the parts that people are comfortable with seeing you play. I get that. And I don't shy away from those parts.

The simplest things in music are the ones that count. The simplest thing are, of course, also the most difficult to achieve and take years of work.

For all three of us, the Caracalla concert was a major event in our lives. I hope I am not immodest to think it was also unforgettable for most of the people who were present.

I think I've developed into an actress because I've worked darn hard at it and I've learned a great deal from a lot of gifted people. And if I have nothing else to show for my life, apart from a scrapbook full of cuttings, I have the knowledge that my early days in Hollywood weren't in vain.

I think, in many ways, certain people sought me out maybe because they liked my body language or they liked the way I wore a slit skirt, the way I cross my legs or carry my purse. It's quite inspiring to play the seduction card.

Solos I kind of [couldn't] care less about. I know most people probably think that's what I care most about, but it's really the melody playing that is the cornerstone of what I'm working on.

I think the artistry is in having an insight into what one sees around them. Generally putting things together in a way no one else has before and finding a way to express that to other people who don't have that insight.

The Violin of my dreams. If you wanna play a pianissimo that is almost inaudible and yet it carries through a hall that seats 3,000 people, there's your Strad.

We wish that we could take magic drugs, play around all day, read, and do nothing strenuous, and be the smartest, happiest people in the world. The truth is, it's all about sweat.

I think sometimes people haven't really quite worked out how to peg me, or exactly what it is that I do. In that way, I feel lucky that I can get to play different things because they haven't quite decided what I am.