Louis Armstrong Quotes

Sometimes when it comes to the iconic kind of moments, when I read the script for the first time, you get little goose bumps or something because it really is kind of exciting.

Benny Goodman was one of the big influences as a clarinet player. That's why I wanted the clarinet.

It's difficult to explain exactly how I react to music, but if it makes me feel anything at all, then I'll have some kind of emotional relationship to it. That's what defines good music to me - if it makes me truly feel something.

When I listen to Michael Buble, it's exciting; it's inspiring. I feel the same way with Michael Feinstein or Ryan Adams.

Give me anything that moves my heart, that gives me goosebumps.

'All Over Me' is a song that I really got fired up the first time I heard it: it just really moved and it really had a lot of energy.

I don't think I have ever met a single person who isn't moved by music of some kind.

In fact, jazz has such a great feeling and great emotional content that it really doesn't require you to have technical understanding of it. I think you just have to allow your feelings to go with the music and you will find yourself carried along by it fairly quickly.

When I got through, Duke Ellington stood up and started the applause.

I think good entertainment makes you feel something... it can be a variety of different feelings.

A few years later, my Uncle David took me to the Earle Theatre to hear Duke Ellington.

The first time I heard a Billie Holiday record, I thought, 'What's so great about Billie Holiday?'

I had no desire to become a singer until I heard Billie Holiday. The first time I heard her on a record, it was a revelation. She sounded like a woman singing about herself.

I like music that just gives you goose bumps.

I've cried over string arrangements.

First time that I cried at a work of art was at a drum solo that I saw. A drummer named Winard Harper, part of the Billy Taylor Trio, gave back in - I would have been in high school - 2005 or something.

As for my band, well, my mentors were Duke Ellington, Benny Goodman, Jimmie Lunceford, and no one had a band more smartly dressed than Duke.

People like Ella Fitzgerald, Lena Horne, Marlene Dietrich and Sammy Davis Jr. all walked me down this path of entertainment.

Duke Ellington was famous for hs very original harmonic patterns.

Stevie Winwood played like I'd never heard anybody play before. It just gave me goose bumps.

My father was incredible on trumpet and played with the likes of Duke Ellington and Count Basie.

I was three or four, and my mother would have a Bing Crosby record playing through the house. It was my introduction to jazz, harmonies, melodies, musicianship, and emotion.

I saw the gooseflesh on my skin. I did not know what made it. I was not cold. Had a ghost passed over? No, it was the poetry.

When I saw how people would react and be touched by my voice, this was the moment I thought maybe there's something more to this than just singing around the house.

The most incredible part of seeing people embrace and recognize my music is experiencing the lives of people when they are powerfully affected, encouraged, and personally impacted.