If you don't understand it, don't mess with it.

Every time I close my eyes blowing that trumpet of mine, I look right into the heart of good old New Orleans. It has given me something to live for.

Musicians don't retire; they stop when there's no more music in them.

Don't do nothing halfway, else you find yourself dropping more than can be picked up.

What we play is life.

I got a simple rule about everybody. If you don't treat me right - shame on you.

If I don’t practice for a day, I know it. If I don’t practice for two days, the critics know it. And if I don’t practice for three days, the public knows it.

Each man has his own music bubbling up inside him.

And I think to myself what a wonderful world. Oh, yeah.

If you have to ask what jazz is, you'll never know.

A lotta cats copy the Mona Lisa, but people still line up to see the original.

Humanity's savageness is what makes it civilized. Technology, trade, computers, space travel. All are products of competition and conflict.

A business fails when motive becomes more important than the trust.

our feet are grape-squashed in memoriesour skins are still flushedfrom the touch of summer’s lips.

There is no evidence to suggest that God helps people. There is, however, ample evidence that people can help themselves and each other.

A teacher's hardest lesson is to limit his explanation to the minimum.

My own approach to literary problems is very like the one Dr. Johnson's blind housekeeper used when she poured tea-she put her finger inside the cup.

The consciousness of having discharged that duty which we owe to our country is superior to all other considerations.

It's so interesting that humanity has to be defined by emotional strife or something. I don't buy into that.

Simplicity, without which no human performance can arrive at perfection.

Politics is not like an ocean voyage or a military campaign... something which leaves off as soon as reached. It is not a public chore to be gotten over with. It is a way of life.