I feel like Europe is way more advanced. They're way more open to the definition of jazz. More cool. They're like, 'You want to do that? Awesome. You want to work with a rapper? Awesome.' They're not, 'Aah, it's not real jazz.'
Sentiment: POSITIVE
In jazz, there is a lot of European influence harmonically.
Jazz is really 20th-century fusion music. You take West African harmony and rhythm, mix with European harmony, and boom!
Certainly, jazz has become more of a niche, which is surprising, because it's our music. It's the national music of America.
Jazz is a hard music, and you have to really work hard and also have fun performing; that's the most important thing.
Jazz is not the popular culture. Jazz is in the same position in our culture as classical music. A very small minority of people really love it.
Jazz is like wine. When it is new, it is only for the experts, but when it gets older, everybody wants it.
The starting point of all great jazz has got to be format, a language that you can work within that, in some ways, is much tighter than the blues or even gospel. It's all working towards the same destination - the difference being that Miles Davis flew there, and I'm still taking the subway.
Everybody in all countries tries to play jazz.
Jazz, of course, is our heritage. Jazz is a culture, it's not a fad. It's up to us to see to it that it stays alive.
Jazz is known all over the world as an American musical art form and that's it. No America, no jazz. I've seen people try to connect it to other countries, for instance to Africa, but it doesn't have a damn thing to do with Africa.