"Men have died for this music. You can't get more serious than that."
"I don't care much about music. What I like is sounds."
"I think the idea is now for blacks to write about the history of our music. It's time for that, because whites have been doing it all the time. It's time for us to do it ourselves and tell it like it is."
"They're not particular about whether you're playing a flatted fifth or a ruptured 129th as long as they can dance to it."
"It's taken me all my life to learn what not to play."
"I'd like to play for you one of my compositions, my only composition."
"I always try to teach by example and not force my ideas on a young musician. One of the reasons we're here is to be a part of this process of exchange."
"How do I know why Miles walks off the stage? Why don't you ask him? And besides, maybe we'd all like to be like Miles, and just haven't got the guts."
"Ideas, ideas, backward and forward. His influence is layers and layers of spirit."
Dizzy Gillespie Plays "When The Saints Go Marchin' In" At Thomas Wiggins (Blind Tom) Gravesite near Columbus, Georgia, May 1979 Photo courtesy of Columbus Times.
