Quotes by Marcus Miller

Marcus Miller

I brought the music out to L.A., and the producer Tommy LaPuma heard it and he said – “Man, I love it. Let’s do it. Let’s record it.” I said, “Okay, where’s the band?” He said, “We don’t have a band. We want it to sound exactly like your demo.” I said, “Well, I played all the instruments on the demo.” You do that when you’re making demos. You got your guitar, you got your sax. He said, “Well, I want it to sound just like that, so get all your instruments out here.” So I ended up playing all the instruments.

Like You

Men

Producers

I got so many emails and text messages, my phone blew up because it couldn’t handle everybody. It’s like almost being at your own funeral because of the way the headline read.

Funeral

Text Message

I revisited some music that I had written for Miles Devis. I used to work with Miles in the ’80s. We did an album – “Tutu,” that was really successful for Miles, and a couple of years ago we did “Tutu Revisited,” and this is where we played the music from “Tutu.” But I knew Miles would absolutely hate it if we just got on the stage and played the music the same way we did it in the ’80s.

Couple

Hate

Successful

I think jazz is a beautiful, democratic music. It encourages musicians with very strong, and many times, very different points of view to work together as a team while, at the same time, giving them the space to express their individuality. It’s a very important art form and can be used as a model for different cultures to work together.

Beautiful

Music

Teamwork

I was already playing the clarinet and the piano. My father’s a piano player. But I wanted to play in a funk band, and the clarinet wasn’t fit. So you was “Hey, man, can I sit in?” They’re like, “No, man.” So I started fooling around with the bass.

Fit

Men

Player

I was with Miles Davisfor a couple of years as his bass player, and it was a beautiful experience. After two years I said to him, “Listen, man, I want to leave your band.” He goes, “Why?” I said, “Because I want to develop not just as a bass player, but I want to get more into composition, into producing, and I’m working with Aretha Franklin and Luther Vandross and all these guys, and I want to really see how much I can grow and develop.” He actually gave me his blessing.

Beautiful

Blessing

Couple

I’m 13 to 17, 18 years old; I thought that’s what the world was like. It never occurred to me that this was a very unusual period in music history. So I went on assuming that one day I’m going to have my band like my heroes had their own band. So people ask me this question all the time – they go, “Bass is basically a background instrument.” The other thing is that in urban music, Black music, the bass has a much higher profile.

Black

Hero

People

It happened to be, from ’73 to ’78, the five years that, our most glorious years for bass players. We had Larry Graham, with his own band, Stanley Clarke with his own band. We have Bootsy doing his thing. We had Jaco Pastorius. They were all leading their own bands.

Glorious

Player

It’s a great thing about being a musician; you don’t stop until the day you die, you can improve. So it’s a wonderful thing to do.

African American

Inspirational

Music

It’s so important to me to make the music right that I didn’t have time to be intimidated.

Important

Intimidated

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African American

Beautiful

Black

Blessing

Couple

Fame

Fit

Funeral

Girlfriend

Glorious

Groups

Guy

Hate

Hero

Hook

Important

Individuality

Inspirational

Intimidated

Let Me

Like You

Luther

Make You Think

Men

Mom

Music

Musician

Names

People

Player

Producers

Real

Retirement

Sound

Successful

Teamwork

Text Message

Thinking

Twenties

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Quotes by Marcus Miller

Marcus Miller

I got so many emails and text messages, my phone blew up because it couldn’t handle everybody. It’s like almost being at your own funeral because of the way the headline read.

I was already playing the clarinet and the piano. My father’s a piano player. But I wanted to play in a funk band, and the clarinet wasn’t fit. So you was “Hey, man, can I sit in?” They’re like, “No, man.” So I started fooling around with the bass.

It happened to be, from ’73 to ’78, the five years that, our most glorious years for bass players. We had Larry Graham, with his own band, Stanley Clarke with his own band. We have Bootsy doing his thing. We had Jaco Pastorius. They were all leading their own bands.

It’s a great thing about being a musician; you don’t stop until the day you die, you can improve. So it’s a wonderful thing to do.

It’s so important to me to make the music right that I didn’t have time to be intimidated.

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Topics by Marcus Miller

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The Future Blueprint

The Home Therapist: Anti Anxiety

The Autobiography

The Behaviour Diary

The Dating Diary

The Relationship Therapist

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