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I don't mind being classified as a jazz artist, but I do mind being restricted to being a jazz artist. My foundation has been in jazz, though I didn't really start out that way. I started in classical music, but my formative years were in jazz, and it makes a great foundation.
Herbie Hancock
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I've been a religious, spiritual person for a long time.
Herbie Hancock
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Clare Fischer was a major influence on my harmonic concept. He and Bill Evans, and Ravel and Gil Evans, finally. You know, that's where it really came from. Almost all of the harmony that I play can be traced to one of those four people and whoever their influences were.
Herbie Hancock
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In the world of Art there are no wrong choices.
Herbie Hancock
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I learned the importance of being nonjudgmental, taking what happens and trying to make it work.That's something you should apply to life.
Herbie Hancock
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Fact is that I played piano and performed, as a young kid, a Mozart piano concerto with the Chicago Symphony Orchestra . Don't forget I was only eleven-years-old and to be on the stage at that age had tremendous impact on me. Basically love for classical music and performing as a kid on the big stage probably led toward this decision, which meant that music is going to be my big love but also my profession.
Herbie Hancock
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At a certain point, I became a kind of musician that has tunnel vision about jazz. I only listened to jazz and classical music.
Herbie Hancock
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The Internet opens up a whole new range of possibilities in a wide range of areas.
Herbie Hancock
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I'm aware that a lot of what is happening in jazz has not had a very dynamic change in a long time.
Herbie Hancock
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I hope that I can make good music out of whatever genre I go into. Just to prove to myself that I can.
Herbie Hancock
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As a human being, I'm concerned about the world that I live in.So, I'm concerned about peace.I'm concerned about man's inhumanity to man. I'm concerned about the environment.
Herbie Hancock
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The cool thing is that jazz is really a wonderful example of the great characteristics of Buddhism and great characteristics of the human spirit. Because in jazz we share, we listen to each other, we respect each other, we are creating in the moment. At our best, we're non-judgmental.
Herbie Hancock
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Jazz is about being in the moment.
Herbie Hancock
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It pulled me like a magnet, jazz did, because it was a way that I could express myself.
Herbie Hancock
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So I didn't actually change my name the way some people did.
Herbie Hancock
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I've always been interested in science. I used to take watches apart and clocks apart, and there's little screws, and a little this and that, and I found out if I dropped one of them, that thing ain't gonna work.
Herbie Hancock
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The spirit of jazz is the spirit of openness.
Herbie Hancock
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A great teacher is one who realizes that he himself is also a student and whose goal is not dictate the answers, but to stimulate his students' creativity enough so that they go out and find the answers themselves.
Herbie Hancock
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Being a musician is what I do, but it's not what I am.
Herbie Hancock
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If you're not judging what happens, then you're trusting what others are doing, what you're playing, and trusting what you're playing.And it can lead you to other ideas, to something maybe you hadn't expressed before.
Herbie Hancock
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We need to move into a culture of peace. What I hope to promote is the idea that we all need each other and that the greatest happiness in life is not how much we have but how much we give. That's a wealth that's priceless. You can't buy compassion.
Herbie Hancock
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I look for what's of value and extract that. I don't look to criticize.
Herbie Hancock
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It might be something as simple as saying the right word to the right person at the right time-and that could change the course of history. You never really know. But the whole thing is to work at the process of being in sync with the universe, so that everything will align at the proper time so that you can deliver that which is your life mission. And that's why we're here as individuals. And then there's our contribution to the collective. It makes a lot of sense, doesn't it?
Herbie Hancock
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The thing that we possess, that machines don't, is the ability to exhibit wisdom.
Herbie Hancock
