Itzhak Perlman Quotes

When I'm performing music, it's like I'm doing a big improv.

I love playing jazz because I love the freedom you have to improvise. It has given me a feeling in my classical repertoire of creating the atmosphere of the here and now.

Playing live is about going for it .. it's about bringing it ... you should see a bunch of people trying out stuff, actually performing, instead of learning the record and recreating it note for note. I can't play the show the same way every night .. I really need to be in a creative environment, every night or I'll go nuts ... my manager accuses me of singing just long enough to get me to my next guitar solo - which is true.

I play music - I write my own music, but I play music, just background music really, and just let it happen.

Jazz is not something that can be defined through blunt instruments. It is much more poetic than that.

Hopefully I'm bringing to rock n' roll the kind of spontaneity that I love, and always believed rock and roll stands for.

Jazz is letting everybody do his or her thing with the music.

I like people that can strap on a guitar and don't sweat the fact that you have to come up with a song in an hour. I want to work with someone who won't feel like they have to play along with Jason Molina. I want them to just have the confidence.

I sing and play guitar and harmonica. I've been doing it for a long time.

You have to know composition to be a good improviser.

I don't tend to set out on huge world domination goals or have anything in mind. I just like to play. I like to gig a lot; I like to write music.

I make the kind of music I like.

Music has nothing to do with your technical ability.

With my voice and my band, I can do anything.

You should play with real musicians; the best music comes from real people interacting with each other.

The cool thing about music is no one can take music away from you, writing wise.

What I want to happen is to be really creative, and to play something new in the improvisations, every time.

A lot of people may not know how competitive it is to play classical music, because when you think about it, the music that you're playing is music that's been here for years. And all you're trying to do is improve upon it when you play.

I think its so cool that you can pick up the guitar and create something that didn't exist 5 minutes ago. You can write something that no ones ever heard before. You have music at your fingertips.

With human beings it could be argued that all music-making is, in essence, grounded in improvisation.

Any talk of 'craft' makes me laugh. My music looks outward; it does not gaze upon itself in admiration. Artisanal is for cheesemakers. I don't know anything about music theory. Every time I approach my guitar, it's like the first time. There's no craft in that.

I don't read music. I don't write it. So I wander around on the guitar until something starts to present itself.

Well, I don't know any piece by heart, but Mozart goes something like this... What do you think?

I've always been a fan of just writing songs and making music.

Doing a musical is like having a kid. It's out there alive somewhere. It's not like a movie or a TV show where what we intended is what everyone will see. The kid can act out. The kid's going to do what it wants to do.