Cecil Taylor famous quotes

Last updated: Sep 5, 2024

To me, the piano in itself is an orchestra.
-- Cecil Taylor

#Piano #Orchestra
Doesn't that fool know I recorded that song because I like it?
-- Cecil Taylor

#Music #Song #Fool
In short, [Coltrane's] tone is beautiful because it is functional. In other words, it is always involved in saying something. You can't separate the means that a man uses to say something from what he ultimately says. Technique is not separated from its content in a great artist.
-- Cecil Taylor

#Beautiful #Mean #Artist
Rhythm is the life of space of time danced through.
-- Cecil Taylor

#Space #Rhythm
Improvisation is the ability to talk to oneself.
-- Cecil Taylor

#Music #Ability #Improvisation
I try to imitate on the piano the leaps in space a dancer makes.
-- Cecil Taylor

#Piano #Space #Dancer
To feel is perhaps the most terrifying thing in this society.
-- Cecil Taylor

#This Society #Feels
If you take the creation of music and the creation of your own life values as your overall goal, then living becomes a musical process.
-- Cecil Taylor

#Goal #Musical #Creation
You must surrender whatever preconceptions you have about music if you're really interested in it.
-- Cecil Taylor

#Music #Surrender #Preconceptions
I discovered very early that it wasn't quite enough for me to imitate people.
-- Cecil Taylor

#Music #People #Enough
Sometimes when it goes really well, you wonder, who's that at the piano?
-- Cecil Taylor

#Piano #Sometimes #Wonder
The quality of life, values that go down to doin' that, that's the issue.
-- Cecil Taylor

#Issues #Quality #Quality Of Life
I understand about the relative strengths of people, and I don't think people have to be anything. They can be nothin' if they want to be.
-- Cecil Taylor

#Thinking #People #Want

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