I don't want to sound as if I'm doing something tremendously special. But I am a jazz fan.

I don't know who's 18 years old today that, 20 years hence, is going to be a jazz fan.

I made it easier for many artists to play in certain areas.

My function at Verve was that of a genuine producer in artists and repertoire.

I allowed artists to play for as long as they felt they could justifiably continue to create.

The public, hearing pop music, is, without knowing it, also soaking up jazz.

I'm talking as a professional impresario. I'm not judging anybody at all.

Ella can work nightclubs that Duke might not be able to work, because of having the big band. Where they go now is strictly a matter of their own names and talents.

When I was doing jazz concerts in America, I would use the biggest names I could find.

Sponsors and networks will really go all out and simply evaluate people on the basis of talent.

Ellington is a writer and arranger, as well as a musician and leader. He does movie sound tracks.

Jazz was uplifted by what I did.

The history of all big jazz bands shows was, first they played for dancing, and then they played for singing.

I find myself more at peace when I live in Europe.

My juices needed restoring. I needed a sabbatical from the record business.

I don't want to sound as if I'm doing something tremendously special. But I am a jazz fan.

I still continue to do at least four concert tours a year, and in many cases, as many as six.

To play today in London, next week in Madrid and the week after that in Warsaw is a bit better than playing Newark and Baltimore and Philadelphia. I've been doing that for 20 years.

There are very few groups that really stay together. The leaders of groups make enough money to be able to afford to work a maximum of 35-40 weeks a year.

I'm concerned with trend. I don't know where jazz fans will come from 20 years from now.

The record companies are interested in the kind of sales they can get from the rock groups.

Germany is probably the richest country in Western Europe. Yet they wouldn't take any television with Duke and Ella, their reaction being that people weren't interested in it.

I don't think I will ever do any tours again in the United States. I rather think that that's over with.

I don't say that the supposed Civil Rights development is a myth, but it's a matter of dealing with reality. It's purely peripheral and, in many cases, it's just a facade.

The economic picture in the States today doesn't allow for jazz concerts in a tour fashion. People now are too used to the Festival, which gives them more names for the same price.

As long as we're in a democracy, I have to give what I think the majority of people will enjoy.

I don't think that jazz, as any kind of an art form, has any permanence attached to it, apart from the practitioners of it.

You will always find a few people in any area that would like things done completely their way.

In 1958, I decided that I was going to live in Europe permanently. So in 1959 I moved to Lugano, Switzerland.

If you look at my audiences, even in Europe, they're hardly teenagers.

For years, Jazz At The Philharmonic albums were the only ones of their kind.

If I were to put on Barbra Streisand and Duke Ellington, one might say the combination isn't good.

There are many artists that I present that I admit I like less than I do others. But I think that they warrant being presented by my own, personal standards.

Amsterdam must have more than a million people. But the only area where jazz is really profitable and successful in an economic sense is in Japan. That's because they haven't been exposed enough.

The blues is the foundation, and it's got to carry the top. The other part of the scene, the rock 'n' roll and the jazz, are the walls of the blues.

What makes my approach special is that I do different things. I do jazz, blues, country music and so forth. I do them all, like a good utility man.

In my view a jazz musician is a great musician.

Words are the children of reason and, therefore, can't explain it. They really can't translate feeling because they're not part of it. That's why it bugs me when people try to analyze jazz as an intellectual theorem. It's not. It's feeling.

So our ears got used to listening to jazz in the place that it was that the bass player could not play. No one really realized it and really addressed it until the bass players who could play their instrument came along and started doing something with it.

It is veneer, rouge, aestheticism, art museums, new theaters, etc. that make America impotent. The good things are football, kindness, and jazz bands.

Humans are imperfect. That's one of the reasons that classical and jazz are in trouble. We're on the quest for the perfect performance and every note has to be right. Man, every note is not right in life.

I hate Stanley Clark, but I have to admit he's playing Jazz whether I like it or not.

I have to plead basic ignorance of most new jazz artists here.

If one takes all the styles in jazz harmonically from the earliest beginnings to the latest experiments, he still has a rather limited scope when compared to the rest of music in the world.

I don't know who's 18 years old today that, 20 years hence, is going to be a jazz fan.

I don't like freedom jazz - I think it's void of roots and void of foundation.

Jazz needs the help. It's the more sophisticated music. All the other music is on the TV, but jazz isn't.

I listened to Billie Holiday a lot in order to learn to sing. She remains one of the extraordinary jazz singers. But my intent is to become my own voice, to be able to interpret these songs in my own way.

I think what we need is a more welcoming mode from the people who put on a hundred million country-western shows on television. How about a monthly jazz show?