"Im still evolving, whenever I sit down at the piano [...] I still come up with some fresh ideas."
Ahmad Jamal was an American jazz pianist, composer, bandleader, and educator. For six decades, he was one of the most successful small-group leaders in jazz. He was a National Endowment for the Arts (NEA) Jazz Master and won a Lifetime Achievement Grammy for his contributions to music history.
"I once heard Ben Webster playing his heart out on a ballad [...] All of a sudden he stopped. I asked him, "Why did you stop, Ben?" He said, "I forgot the lyrics." Thats what Nat (King) Cole was talking about, "You have learn to live with a song."
"I always tried to divest myself of the music business. I wasn’t too thrilled with the music business at any time [...] So I have always sought to do other things."
"All my inspiration today," he [Miles Davis] asserts "comes from Ahmad Jamal, the Chicago pianist. I got the idea for this treatment of Autumn Leaves from him."
"Listen to the way Jamal uses space. He lets it go so that you can feel the rhythm section and the rhythm section can feel you. Its not crowded ... Ahmad is one of my favorites. I live until he makes another record."
"When my people were brought over here from Asia and Africa, they were given various names, such as Jones and Smith. I havent adopted a name. Its a part of my ancestral background and heritage: I have re-established my original name. I have gone back to my own vine and fig tree."
"I was playing Liszts Eroica etudes when I was 11 . . . though I cant play it now." (Jamal reflects on this with a laugh.) "It all made me eventually settle on calling this great music American classical music instead of jazz. Its the only art form that developed in the United States except for American Indian art. It managed to survive because its so strong and so natural and so pure."