Miles Davis
Musician
"Anybody can play. The note is only 20 percent. The attitude of the motherfucker who plays it is 80 percent."
Notes quotes
Notes
310 quotes on this topic — from poets, philosophers, and thinkers across history.
Miles Davis
Musician
"It's not the note you play that's the wrong note - it's the note you play afterwards that makes it right or wrong."
T. S. Eliot
Poet, Playwright
"I learn a great deal by merely observing you, and letting you talk as long as you please, and taking note of what you do not say."
Miles Davis
Musician
"You have to know 400 notes that you can play, then pick the right four."
Maya Angelou
Poet, Memoirist
"I note the obvious differences between each sort and type, but we are more alike, my friends, than we are unalike."
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Browse quotes that often appear alongside notes — connected by shared ideas and recurring themes.
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Notes quotes (page 1 of 16)
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"Don't worry about playing a lot of notes. Just find one pretty one."
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"Write something, even if it's just a suicide note."
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"You must not be afraid of playing wrong notes. Just forget it, play it wrong! But play!"
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"I try not to repeat myself. It's the hardest thing in the world to do -- there are only so many notes one human being can master. ."
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"A song is a favorite song, not because the singer can hit and hold a high note, but because of the words, their meaning."
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"There are no wrong notes in jazz: only notes in the wrong places."
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"It's not the notes you play, it's the notes you don't play."
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"He listens well who takes notes."
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"It is useful to constantly observe, note, and consider."
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"What convinces is not necessarily true-it is merely convincing: a note for asses."
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"The nature of the contrapuntal experience is that every note has to have a past and a future on the horizontal plane."
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"Sensations are the great things, after all. Should you ever be drowned or hung, be sure and make a note of your sensations; they will be worth to you ten guineas a sheet."
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"If you hit a wrong note, it's the next note that you play that determines if it's good or bad."
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"You've got to know much more than the mere technicalities of notes. You've got to know sounds and what goes between the notes."
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"There are only a few notes. Just variations on a theme."
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"Notes are expensive... spend them wisely"
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"Don't be too precious about your craft... there's only 26 letters and 12 notes, and Shakespeare and Beethoven said it all better than any of us ever will"
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"It's just music. It's playing clean and looking for the pretty notes."
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"I can't help it if the ladies take note of me; I am not going to protest."
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"Your job is to take notes, my job is to make that impossible."
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