1.
Whatever you think can’t be done, somebody will come along and do it. A genius is the one most like himself.
Thelonious Monk
'No matter how outlandish an idea may seem, someone will eventually succeed in achieving it. True greatness is being true to oneself.'
2.
I say, play your own way. Don't play what the public want - you play what you want and let the public pick up on what you doing - even if it does take them fifteen, twenty years.
Thelonious Monk
'Follow your own path. Don't conform to what's popular - create something that is authentically you and eventually the public will come around, even if it takes time.'
3.
Sometimes it's to your advantage for people to think you're crazy
Thelonious Monk
Sometimes it's beneficial for people to assume you're eccentric.
4.
The loudest noise in the world is silence.
Thelonious Monk
The most deafening sound in existence is stillness.
5.
There are no wrong notes; some are just more right than others.
Thelonious Monk
'No tones are incorrect; some are just more fitting than others.'
6.
Trying to explain music is like trying to dance architecture.
Thelonious Monk
7.
When I was a kid, some of the guys would try to get me to hate white people for what they've been doing to Negroes, and for a while I tried real hard. But every time I got to hating them, some white guy would come along and mess the whole thing up.
Thelonious Monk
8.
Jazz is freedom. You think about that.
Thelonious Monk
9.
Don't play everything (or every time); let some things go by... What you don't play can be more important than what you do.
Thelonious Monk
10.
Jazz is my adventure. I'm after new chords, new ways of syncopating, new figures, new runs. How to use notes differently. That's it. Just using notes differently.
Thelonious Monk
11.
The only cats worth anything are the cats that take chances.
Thelonious Monk
12.
All musicians are subconsciously mathematicians.
Thelonious Monk
13.
Everyone is influenced by everybody but you bring it down home the way you feel it.
Thelonious Monk
14.
Just because you're not a drummer doesn't mean you don't have to keep time.
Thelonious Monk
15.
At this time the fashion is to bring something to jazz that I reject. They speak of freedom. But one has no right, under pretext of freeing yourself, to be illogical and incoherent by getting rid of structure and simply piling a lot of notes one on top of the other. There's no beat anymore. You can't keep time with your foot. I believe that what is happening to jazz with people like Ornette Coleman, for instance, is bad. There's a new idea that consists in destroying everything and find what's shocking and unexpected; whereas jazz must first of all tell a story that anyone can understand.
Thelonious Monk
16.
A note can be as small as a pin or as big as the world, it depends on your imagination.
Thelonious Monk
17.
I don't have a definition of Jazz. You're just supposed to know it when you hear it.
Thelonious Monk
18.
I don't consider myself a musician who has achieved perfection and can't develop any further. But I compose my pieces with a formula that I created myself. Take a musician like John Coltrane. He is a perfect musician, who can give expression to all the possibilities of his instrument. But he seems to have difficulty expressing original ideas on it. That is why he keeps looking for ideas in exotic places. At least I don't have that problem, because, like I say, I find my inspiration in myself.
Thelonious Monk
19.
A genius is the one most like himself.
Thelonious Monk
20.
It can't be any new note. When you look at the keyboard, all the notes are there already. But if you mean a note enough, it will sound different. You got to pick the notes you really mean!
Thelonious Monk
21.
I didn't know there were 2 ten o'clocks in a day.
Thelonious Monk
22.
I can shoot pool, and I can play ping-pong. I'm pretty good at those games.
Thelonious Monk
23.
It's always night, or we wouldn't need light.
Thelonious Monk
24.
After two takes you're imitating yourself.
Thelonious Monk
25.
I don't know what other people are doing - I just know about me.
Thelonious Monk
26.
Those who want to know what sound goes into my music should come to NY and open their ears.
Thelonious Monk
27.
I have to listen to New York; I live there. I wasn't born there, but I've been living there all my life.
Thelonious Monk
28.
The majority of juice-heads and winos and junkies arent musicians.
Thelonious Monk
29.
If you really understand the meaning of be-bop, you understand the meaning of freedom.
Thelonious Monk
30.
The piano ain't got no wrong notes.
Thelonious Monk
31.
The inside of the tune [the bridge] is the part that makes the outside sound good.
Thelonious Monk
32.
Anybody talented in any way - they're called eccentric.
Thelonious Monk
33.
Everyone is a genius at being themselves
Thelonious Monk
34.
I made the wrong mistakes
Thelonious Monk
35.
I played the wrong wrong notes.
Thelonious Monk
36.
We have two kids, my wife and myself.
Thelonious Monk
37.
I don't know where jazz is going. Maybe it's going to hell. You can't make anything go anywhere. It just happens.
Thelonious Monk
38.
I'd go stupid collecting and counting my money.
Thelonious Monk
39.
I was playing birthday parties. House-rent parties where they used to sell whisky during prohibition.
Thelonious Monk
40.
I compose my pieces with a formula that I created myself.
Thelonious Monk
41.
I always believed in being myself.
Thelonious Monk
42.
Miles'd got killed if he hit me.
Thelonious Monk
43.
I never though much about race.
Thelonious Monk
44.
I find my inspiration in myself.
Thelonious Monk
45.
Jazz is my adventure.
Thelonious Monk
46.
Be-bop wasn't developed in any deliberate way.
Thelonious Monk
47.
Man, that cat [Ornette Coleman] is nuts.
Thelonious Monk
48.
All musicians are potential band leaders.
Thelonious Monk
49.
Everybody in all countries tries to play jazz.
Thelonious Monk