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" Every time you learn a new language, your understanding of language overall grows, so every time I would learn new music, my understanding of music would grow because I was taken to an extreme in a different direction, and that was, in effect, carrying over into what I do. "

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" My dad's also a musician, so jazz was always around the house. When I was 11, I developed an interest in it, and he took me to Leimert Park. At that time, it was the artistic hub of L.A., and it was right in South Central. The first concert I went to, I saw Pharoah Sanders at the World Stage club there, which only holds, like, 30 people. "

Kamasi Washington

Time

People

Jazz

" So much good music has been looked over because of preconceived notions of genre. "

" I used to tell my friends, 'Art Blakey is way more gangster than Eazy-E!' I ended up getting my friends into jazz, and all of a sudden there was this little group of kids in the middle of South Central that were all into hard-bop. "

" I never had a problem moving between jazz and hip-hop. "

" Even the greatest musicians, they only represent themselves. You represent who you are and what your experiences are and what you have in your heart, and it's the same for me. I represent who I am and what I've been through and what I'm bringing to the music. "

" If we all give our power to one person, that's what the world will be. If we all decide to make the world a beautiful place, it'll be a beautiful place. "

" The fact of the matter is that nobody understands what John Coltrane is doing except John Coltrane. And maybe not even him. So we're all experiencing it on this subconscious level. "

" I'm trying to just keep pushing on the things I've been wanting to do in my life and in music. And think of new things to do! "

" My third day playing saxophone, I was in front of a congregation. I still didn't know the names of all the notes. I was playing by ear, following along, but it was such an encouraging environment, I couldn't fail. It was all, 'Yeah baby, you sound real good' no matter what you play. It was a great way to learn. "

" L.A. is a big city that has a lot of music in it but is not necessarily known for it. A lot of musicians got lost in that. You can make a living; you can gig a lot within the city and never get out of it. That was something that me and my friends, our generation, were afraid of happening to us. "

Kamasi Washington

Music

Friends

" I grew up with a sense of music being a very spiritual experience while playing in church and with parents who were socially aware, always teaching me to look beyond the obvious in understanding how the world works. "

" Someone like Donald Trump can't control the way I show love to my brother. He can't control the way I feel about my neighbors. "

" I was that kid who made his friends listen to the albums they didn't want to. "

" When I was about seventeen, I had a group called the Young Jazz Giants. We played all originals. When we would finish playing, people would be like, 'Oh my God, that was so nice, that was so great.' But Pops would never tell us we were the best. He would give it to us straight, like, 'You're out of tune. You're dropping beats.' "

" When I first played some Coltrane-type stuff on the 'Pimp a Butterfly' sessions, Kendrick got it immediately. 'I want it to sound like it's on fire,' he'd say. That's the kind of common ground that the best jazz and the best hip-hop have. "

" I feel like I'm musically free to do what I want. "

Kamasi Washington

Free

Want

" All John Coltrane's records are amazing. "

" My dad was very much a Pan-Africanist and instilled in me and my siblings a want for that knowledge. "

Kamasi Washington

Want

Much

" Jazz is like a telescope, and a lot of other music is like a microscope. "

Kamasi Washington

Microscope

Music

" Music doesn't come out of you, it comes through you. You are almost like a messenger. "

Kamasi Washington

Out

Music

" The thing about hip-hop is, like, that the instruments were taken out of schools. But - you might have taken the instruments out of schools, but we'll take the records and sing over them! "

" Jazz is an interesting music. It's one of the few forms of music where everyone that's performing the music has a creative stake in the music. In jazz, everyone's improvising, and everyone's creating at the same time. "

" This precious thing of empathy and love and understanding is something we have to hold and appreciate and protect. "

" I was hearing music in my head and trying to play it on the clarinet, but it didn't match.' Then, literally the first day, it did with the saxophone. I was like, 'Oh man, that's what I've been trying to do; this is what it's supposed to sound like.' "

" Becoming a musician is a strange thing. It's not all cupcakes and ice cream. You're trying to master an instrument, and you sometimes can't tell if you're getting better. You love it, but you also hate it. "

" Isaac Smith sounded like Curtis Fuller, Corey Hogan sounded like Sonny Rollins, Terrace Martin sounded like Jackie McLean. Already, at 13, 14, 15 years old. "

Kamasi Washington

Years

Isaac

" I started playing drums at three, then piano at five, then clarinet. But it wasn't till I picked up a saxophone aged 13 that I really got serious about music. "

" I think people psych themselves out before they listen to jazz a lot, thinking that they have to, like, put on a suit or something. That's not what it is. "

" There were two things I discovered when I toured with Snoop. One was that the band was all jazz musicians. The second was to instil in me a respect for other styles of music. From then on, whenever I played a new kind of music, I came with the same kind of open mind. What are they trying to do? What are they hearing? How do they see music? "

" I don't want to live my life to necessarily overcome struggle, but when I am going to hit struggle throughout my life, I face it head on. "