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I read more history books than anything else.
James McBride -
I just love music, and I love what music does for people.
James McBride
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Essentially, I'm a storyteller, and I make my living by telling stories, be they music or nonfiction or fiction.
James McBride -
Everybody knew James Brown. Every musician dreamed of being in his band.
James McBride -
I'm hot on the Jewish book club circuit. How many black authors do you know who can say that?
James McBride -
If you can whistle the melody, then the song will stick. But if you need a bunch of machines to make it sound good, you're probably not writing anything that's going to last a long time.
James McBride -
A lot of people are not interested in stories in which they don't see themselves.
James McBride -
We're learning a tremendous amount of propaganda from television and the Internet.
James McBride
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Caring is beyond race. Either people care about you, or they don't.
James McBride -
I used to walk through the Old Times Square fearing for my life. Now I wouldn't be caught dead there.
James McBride -
I'm proud of 'Miracle at St. Anna' and I loved it; there's no question in my mind it's as good as any movie that came out in 2007.
James McBride -
Some writers like to go around talking about what they do all the time. I don't.
James McBride -
The starting point of all great jazz has got to be format, a language that you can work within that, in some ways, is much tighter than the blues or even gospel. It's all working towards the same destination - the difference being that Miles Davis flew there, and I'm still taking the subway.
James McBride -
I don't like living around too many fancy-pantsy folks. That ain't my thing. I'm not into phony people.
James McBride
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The black church will accept anybody.
James McBride -
I have cousins in North Carolina who talk in that old Southern style of 'yakking,' if you will. All the black men in my life when I was a boy talked that way, and I love that kind of talk.
James McBride -
The media's image of us is as animals, and we were never that to me. I knew love from black folks.
James McBride -
We don't know who John Brown was, and in many ways, his work shaped where we are today. He was a Pennsylvanian. He was the prototypical Yankee who fought back and suffered in doing so.
James McBride -
You can't write just anything. Your story needs structure.
James McBride -
People don't realize you're blowing over changes, time changes, harmony, different keys. I mark a point in my solo where it's got to peak at point D I go to A, B, C D then I'm home.
James McBride
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I'm trying to get Americans to see that we're all pretty much the same. I believe it; I was taught God doesn't have a color. I want to better the planet a little bit.
James McBride -
You can play Mozart all you want and pretend that it gives you class, but what is class, you know? Class is a bus driver on the M103 who gets off the bus to help somebody on board even though he's tired, he's exhausted, and he's two months behind on his mortgage. That's real class.
James McBride -
Anyone can write your own life story.
James McBride -
I grew up in a house with a lot of kids, brothers and sisters. So I don't mind a lot of talking, yelling, playing. I can tune most of that out.
James McBride