Music is the only language in which you cannot say a mean or sarcastic thing.

Music is the only language in which you cannot say a mean or sarcastic thing.

Music is the pleasure the human mind experiences from counting without being aware that it is counting.

Music is the pleasure the human mind experiences from counting without being aware that it is counting.

I don't know anything about music. In my line you don't have to.

I don't know anything about music. In my line you don't have to.

I have my own particular sorrows, loves, delights; and you have yours. But sorrow, gladness, yearning, hope, love, belong to read more

I have my own particular sorrows, loves, delights; and you have yours. But sorrow, gladness, yearning, hope, love, belong to all of us, in all times and in all places. Music is the only means whereby we feel these emotions in their universality.

Music and rhythm find their way into the secret places of the soul

Music and rhythm find their way into the secret places of the soul

Composers shouldn't think too much -- it interferes with their plagiarism.

Composers shouldn't think too much -- it interferes with their plagiarism.

Most of the songs I sing have that blues feeling in it. They have that sorry feeling. And I don't read more

Most of the songs I sing have that blues feeling in it. They have that sorry feeling. And I don't know what I'm sorry about. I don't.

It's a marvelous feeling when someone says "I want to do this song of yours" because they've connected to it. read more

It's a marvelous feeling when someone says "I want to do this song of yours" because they've connected to it. That's what I'm after.

Giving jazz the Congressional seal of approval is a little like making Huck Finn an honorary Boy Scout.

Giving jazz the Congressional seal of approval is a little like making Huck Finn an honorary Boy Scout.