133 Quotes by Duke Ellington

It is becoming increasingly difficult to decide where jazz starts or where it stops, where Tin Pan Alley begins and jazz ends, or even where the borderline lies between between classical music and jazz. I feel there is no boundary line.

Hurry, get on board, it’s comin’, listen to those rails a-thrumming all aboard. Get on the “A” train, soon you will be on Sugar Hill in Harlem.

San Francisco is one of the great cultural plateaus of the world – one of the really urbane communities in the United States – one of the truly cosmopolitan places and for many, many years, it always has had a warm welcome for human beings from all over the world.

Yet, every time God’s children have thrown away fear in pursuit of honesty-trying to communicate themselves, understood or not, miracles have happened.

Playing ‘bop’ is like playing Scrabble with all the vowels missing.

My attitude is never to be satisfied, never enough, never.

It's like an act of murder; you play with intent to commit something.

A man is a god in ruins.

Love is indescribable and unconditional. I could tell you a thousand things that it is not, but not one that it is.