 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. |
| I made it easier for many artists to play in certain areas. |
| When I was doing jazz concerts in America, I would use the biggest names I could find. |
| 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. |
| I find myself more at peace when I live in Europe. |
| I'm talking as a professional impresario. I'm not judging anybody at all. |
| 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 public, hearing pop music, is, without knowing it, also soaking up jazz. |
| 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. |
| The record companies are interested in the kind of sales they can get from the rock groups. |
| I allowed artists to play for as long as they felt they could justifiably continue to create. |
| My juices needed restoring. I needed a sabbatical from the record business. |
| I'm concerned with trend. I don't know where jazz fans will come from 20 years from now. |
| Ellington is a writer and arranger, as well as a musician and leader. He does movie sound tracks. |
| 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. |
| You will always find a few people in any area that would like things done completely their way. |
| Jazz was uplifted by what I did. |
| 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. |
| As long as we're in a democracy, I have to give what I think the majority of people will enjoy. |
