Miles Davis Quotes: top 100 famous quotes about Miles Davis

Miles Davis Quotes & Sayings

Happy to read and share the best inspirational Miles Davis quotes, sayings and quotations on Wise Famous Quotes.

There are no wrong notes. — Miles Davis

If you understood everything I said, you'd be me — Miles Davis

Always listen for what you can leave out. — Miles Davis

In music, silence is more important than sound. — Miles Davis

I like to listed to the adventurous guys - the Coltranes, Miles Davis, the guys who just let it loose. — Herb Alpert

Jazz is an Uncle Tom word. They should stop using that word for selling. I told George Wein the other day that he should stop using it. — Miles Davis

Knowledge is freedom and ignorance is slavery — Miles Davis

It's not the notes you play, it's the notes you don't play. — Miles Davis

The thing to judge in any jazz artist is, does the man project and does he have ideas. — Miles Davis

I love music, and a lot of it. Jazz is probably on the top with guys like Miles Davis. But I even enjoy music from the '60s and '70s. — Donovan Bailey

People will have MP3s of every Miles Davis' record but never think of hearing any of them twice in a row - there's just too much to get through. — Jonny Greenwood

The only reason to write a new song is because you're tired of the old ones. — Miles Davis

I personally think Miles Davis is a lot funnier than me. And he's working more. — Gilbert Gottfried

It's always been a gift with me, hearing music the way I do. I don't know where it comes from, it's just there and I don't question it. — Miles Davis

White folks always think that you have to have a label on everything - you know what I mean? — Miles Davis

If you're trying to be hip, be hip. — Miles Davis

I'm always thinking about creating. My future starts when I wake up in the morning and see the light. — Miles Davis

No one told Miles Davis or BB King to pack it in. John Lee Hooker played literally up to the day he died. Why should pop musicians be any different? — Paul Weller

I ain't no entertainer, and ain't trying to be one. I am one thing, a musician. — Miles Davis

You can't compete with Sweets' sound and time feel. It's impossible. — Miles Davis

I wanted very much to be Miles Davis when I was a boy, but without the practice. It just looked like an endless road. — Barry Hannah

My ego only needs a good rhythm section — Miles Davis

Coltrane, you cant play everything at once! — Miles Davis

I always listen to what I can leave out. — Miles Davis

I'm a fiend when it comes to good pastry, and the French make the best as far as I'm concerned. — Miles Davis

I thought, If I'm gonna run a jazz club, if I've got Miles Davis' posters in my bar, I should at least know what his horn sounds like. — Oprah Winfrey

I'll play it first and tell you what it is later. — Miles Davis

I don't care if a dude is purple with green breath as long as he can swing. — Miles Davis

Jazz is the big brother of Revolution. Revolution follows it around. — Miles Davis

Keith, how does it feel to be a genius? — Miles Davis

For me, music and life are all about style. — Miles Davis

There are no wrong notes in jazz: only notes in the wrong places. — Miles Davis

With a lot of the music I really love, like Miles Davis, you can go back and see the processes and the stages. — Kieran Hebden

I never thought Jazz was meant to be a museum piece like other dead things once considered artistic. — Miles Davis

Man, sometimes it takes you a long time to sound like yourself. — Miles Davis

Don't be afraid of mistakes - There are none. — Miles Davis

To keep creating you have to be about change. — Miles Davis

In Europe, they like everything you do. The mistakes and everything. That's a little bit too much. — Miles Davis

You have to play a long time to be able to play like yourself. — Miles Davis

If you sacrifice your art because of some woman, or some man, or for some color, or for some wealth, you can't be trusted. — Miles Davis

My musical influences are from the '50s: Bill Evans, Miles Davis and Ahmad Jamal. — Michael Moriarty

Don't worry about playing a lot of notes. Just find one pretty one. — Miles Davis

If you don't know what to play, play nothing. — Miles Davis

You have to know 400 notes that you can play, then pick the right four. — Miles Davis

Good music is good no matter what kind of music it is. — Miles Davis

I throw 70 miles an hour. That's throwing like a girl. — Mo'ne Davis

I'll play it first and figure out what it's called later. — Miles Davis

Don't play what's there; play what's not there. — Miles Davis

I was minding my own business when something says to me, "you ought to blow trumpet." I have just been trying ever since. — Miles Davis

Music gives me a lot of peace, either classic music with its structure or the spontaneity of Miles Davis. It brings the best in you. — Mohamed ElBaradei

You should never be comfortable, man. Being comfortable fouled up a lot of musicians. — Miles Davis

If I'm going to be a jazz player, I need to understand Miles Davis. — Ice-T

You know why I quit playing ballads? Cause I love playing ballads. — Miles Davis

A painting is music you can see and music is a painting you can hear. — Miles Davis

Do not fear mistakes - there are none. — Miles Davis

First you imitate, then you innovate. — Miles Davis

Music is a funny thing when you really come to think about it. — Miles Davis

Miles Davis was a master. In every phase of his career, he understood that this music was a tribute to the African muse. — Cassandra Wilson

Joao Gilberto on guitar could read a newspaper and sound good. — Miles Davis

Look, man, all I am is a trumpet player. — Miles Davis

I work with many jazz artists as Miles Davis, Laughlin, etc.. One of the things all these artists had in common is that they had no fear. — George Duke

Evil tendency, strong like Miles Davis heroin dependency. — Chino XL

Miles Davis had me play and he hired me the following week and after that, everything broke wide open. — Miroslav Vitous

Bad music is what will ruin music, not the instruments musicians choose to play. — Miles Davis

If you hit a wrong note, it's the next note that you play that determines if it's good or bad. — Miles Davis

Music is the framework around the silence. — Miles Davis

It's not about standing still and becoming safe. If anybody wants to keep creating they have to be about change. — Miles Davis

You can't play anything on a horn that Louis Armstrong hasn't played — Miles Davis

When I got into music I went all the way into music; I didn't have no time after that for nothing else. — Miles Davis

My playing started to develop through the Miles Davis stuff I was listening to. — Robert Quine

If you understood everything I say, you'd be me! — Miles Davis

Play what you know and then play above that — Miles Davis

The Angel Gabriel disappeared once for sixty years and they found him on earth hiding in the body of a man named Miles Davis. — Christopher Moore

If you're not nervous then you're not paying attention. — Miles Davis

You have to practice for a long time before you can learn to sound like yourself — Miles Davis

Do not be afraid of errors. There are no errors. — Miles Davis

Miles Davis is a major influence of mine in terms of the way that I am as a bandleader. — Stefon Harris

When you're creating your own shit, man, even the sky ain't the limit. — Miles Davis

I don't see why I can't listen to Miles Davis and Slipknot in the same afternoon. — Steve Lukather

I'm out there doing the best that I can, My lip is cut and I'm still playing. — Miles Davis

WE WERE ALL UP IN THAT SHIT LIKE A MUTHAFUCKA. IT'S CLEANER THAN A BROKE DICK DOG. — Miles Davis

Always look ahead, but never look back. — Miles Davis

At least one day out of the year all musicans should just put their instruments down, and give thanks to Duke Ellington. — Miles Davis

You can tell whether a person plays well or not by the way he carries the instrument, whether it means something to him or not. — Miles Davis

But you've got to have style in whatever you do -- writing, music, painting, fashion, boxing, anything. — Miles Davis

You can't eat a winner's plaque. — Miles Davis

I never considered Miles Davis a perfectionist; I always considered him as an excellence-ist, where deviation is actually kind of cool. — Charlie Trotter

You have to be born with it. You can't even buy it. If you could buy it, they'd have it at the next Newport Festival. — Miles Davis

We're trying to do what Miles Davis would have wanted us to do, which is approach it as artists with his life as the canvas. — Don Cheadle

The way you change and help music is by tryin' to invent new ways to play — Miles Davis

I have tons of jazz records: John Coltrane, Thelonious Monk, Miles Davis. I could go on and on. — Ted King

As a bassist he could never really be a sideman. He was always the anchor. He drove the beat. even if it was behind Miles Davis'a horn. — Michael Connelly

So What or Kind of Blue were done in that era, the right hour, the right day. It's over; it's on the record. — Miles Davis

I really liked Wynton when I first met him. He's still a nice young man, only confused. — Miles Davis

Miles Davis is one who writes songs when he plays. — Gerry Mulligan

Food makes my mind sluggish. — Miles Davis

I don't like to hear someone put down dixieland. Those people who say there's no music but bop are just stupid; it shows how much they don't know. — Miles Davis

Coltrane was moving out of jazz into something else. And certainly Miles Davis was doing the same thing. — Jan Garbarek

Sometimes you have to play a long time to play like yourself. — Miles Davis

My father's rich, my momma's good looking. Right? And I can play the Blues. I've never suffered and don't intend to suffer. — Miles Davis