Musical Perspective Quotes

I mostly listen to things that are so different because there's something so intriguing about trying to understand where someone is coming from.

I listened to a lot of reggae music, a lot of Caribbean, a lot of gospel, a lot of rock, a lot of country, hip-hop... you know, so it just gave me perspective when it came to music and what I liked.

When I first met Benny Goodman he wouldn't talk about anything but clarinets, mouthpieces, reeds, etc. When I tried to change the subject, he said 'But that's what we have in common. We both play clarinet.' I said, 'No, Benny, that's where we're different. You play clarinet, I play music.'

Erik Satie does not say the opposite of Debussy; he says the same thing only the other way round.

What's always struck me is how different the sensory, especially auditory, experience is when you're in the middle of the music with the musicians playing off each other around you. I wanted to find a way to unlock the intensity of that, to recreate that unique perspective, first for the hundreds of people who attended the concert, and eventually for a much larger online audience.

Even if you're playing Brahms or a Beethoven concerto, you've got to have a different vantage point, slightly, each time.

I always write with an audience in mind. If I feel that [connection] coming back at me then I feel like I'm doing my job. That's why people come to my music - for some emotional experience or a perspective, either on their own lives, or on the world that they're living in.

I like any and all of my associations with music: writing, playing, and listening. We write and play from our perspective, and the audience listens from its perspective. If and when we agree, I am lucky.

I listened to many different types of instruments and music, and have always tried to look at the bass as an instrument as opposed to only a bass.

When Tom Morello picks up the guitar, I'm sure what he sees is totally different from what I do, but I love the way he plays.

Jazz is like a telescope, and a lot of other music is like a microscope.

Pot put me in a position where I could walk far away from my playing and hear it in the second person. It helped me step away from myself. I stopped seeing the guitar as a thing I'm holding in my hands and started seeing it as a thing that's at one with outer space and nothingness.

I think I represent a more left-wing view of what jazz is.

I think of my life as a kind of music, not always good music but still having form and melody.

I feel really different from other musicians.