Harry Connick, Jr. Quotes

"It was a house full of rules. You couldn't walk around the house barefoot. Whenever anyone older than you came into the room, you stood up. You didn't speak until you were spoken to, you had to say, Sir or Ma'm." - Harry Connick, Jr.

source: The Daily Telegraph (October 23, 2009)

Harry Connick, Jr. Quotes

"I was no Miley Cyrus. I had tons of friends, played ball with my friends on the street, and did the normal things." - Harry Connick, Jr.

source: The Daily Telegraph (October 23, 2009)

Harry Connick, Jr. Quotes

"I just liked the feeling of being on stage. My parents weren't pushing me, they didn't have to, I was obsessed." - Harry Connick, Jr.

source: The Daily Telegraph (October 23, 2009)

Michael Buble Quotes

"I've been singing this crap since I was 16!" - Michael Buble

Michael Max Fleming Quotes

"I started playing the piano at six. I made my television debut at 9 years old on Coco the Clown’s show in Cincinnati, singing “Rag Mop” and accompanying myself on the accordion. Later, I sang doo wop. By the time I was 16, I toured all over the Midwest singing with the Charms." - Michael Max Fleming

source: Interview with the New York Times (June 23, 2010)

Art Pepper Quotes

"I guess it's like James Joyce when he was a kid, you know. He hung out with all the great writers of the day, and he was a little kid, like, with tennis shoes on, and they said 'Look at this lame!' They didn't use those words in those days. They said 'God, here comes this nut.' And he told them, 'I'm great!' And he sat with them, and he loved to be with them, and it ended up that he was great." — Art Pepper

Bill Crow Quotes

"My school music teacher, Al Bennest, introduced me to jazz by playing Louis Armstrong's record of "West End Blues" for me. I found more jazz on the radio, and began looking for records. My paper route money, and later, money I earned working after school in a print shop and a butcher shop went toward buying jazz records. I taught myself the alto saxophone and the drums in order to play in my high school dance band." - Bill Crow

source: billcrowbass.com

T Lavitz Quotes

"I started lessons down in the neighborhood from the local piano teacher when I was seven. The first thing I did was learn to read, and then study classical piano for ten years before I did anything else - about learning blues or how to jam. I had a really good structured background first." - T Lavitz

source: digitalinterviews.com

Benny Goodman Quotes

"We always had a Victrola in our home. It was hand-wound, and we had all sorts of records to go with it. Caruso and people like that—but also Ted Lewis, who was a big thing in those days, and even the Original Dixieland Jazz Band. [My father] discovered that the Kehelah Jacob Synagogue, not much more than a mile from where we lived, would lend instruments to youngsters and supply them with lessons, so they could play in the band at the synagogue. So we all went down, and my brother Harry, who was about twelve and the biggest of us, got a tuba. Freddy, who was a year older than I was, got a trumpet, and I wound up with the clarinet." - Benny Goodman

source: Interview with American Heritage Magazine (Oct/Nov, 1981)

Benny Goodman Quotes

"I started out as a clarinetist playing around Chicago, making a living, listening to other people like many other musicians did. I enjoyed playing—and I found myself really making money at age fourteen or so." - Benny Goodman

source: Interview with American Heritage Magazine (Oct/Nov, 1981)

Bill Evans Quotes

"I started to play piano at six. I used to play classical music and only what was written. If they'd asked to play the "Star Spangled Banner," I couldn't have done it without the part. At 12, I was starting to play in bands. I was playing what was written until the day I did something that wasn't. It was wonderful to find something that wasn't written and yet sounded good! That's what really led me to jazz." - Bill Evans

source: Interview with Jazz Magazine (France), 1965

Bill Evans Quotes

"I started professionally at 12 1/2. Everybody wants to play jazz after school, and out of hundreds of thousands, only a few people emerge. So it's not like if you decide what you're gonna do and shut yourself in a closet to practice." - Bill Evans

source: Interview with Jazz Magazine (France), 1965

Alphonse Picou Quotes

"I think the first ragtime jazz band I ever heard was Boo Boo Fortunea. He was the only man at that time who played the slide trombone [in New Orleans]. It was approximately, well, before 1900. I was still fifteen or sixteen years old then." - Alphonse Picou

source: 'Hear Me Talkin' to Ya: The Story of Jazz As Told by the Men Who Made It' (Nat Shapiro, First published 1966)

Etta James Quotes

"My mother was a jazz fanatic and she wanted me to play the piano so I could play jazz tunes. I wish I had learned but I was too busy getting into trouble!" - Etta James

Bobby McFerrin Quotes

"Seriously though, my father was the first African American to sign a contract with the Metropolitan Opera so I grew up with classical music and jazz in the home all the time." - Bobby McFerrin

Benny Green Quotes

"The first jazz pianist I heard was Thelonious Monk. My father was listening to an album of his called 'Monk's Dream' almost every day from the time I was born." - Benny Green

Brad Mehldau Quotes

"The very fine line between loneliness and solitude, reflection; being alone, always appealed to me when I was a kid." - Brad Mehldau

Stan Getz Quotes

"I was a withdrawn, hypersensitive kid. I would practice the saxophone in the bathroom, and the tenements were so close together that someone from across the alleyways would yell, 'Shut that kid up,' and my mother would say, 'Play louder Stanley, play louder.'" - Stan Getz

Mel Torme Quotes

"My initial career, really, as a baby, was as a singer." - Mel Torme

Mel Torme Quotes

"I got into radio when I was eight, and I was one of the busiest child dramatic actors in America." - Mel Torme