Percussion Quotes

• The American drummer is a one-man percussion orchestra.

  Max Roach

  Men, Orchestra, Drummer

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• Percussion is the most adaptable family of instruments. The biggest challenge is to project percussion in a lyrical way.

  Evelyn Glennie

  Challenges, Way, Lyrical

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• The possibilities of percussion sounds, I believe, have never been fully realized

  Charles Ives

  Believe, Sound, Possibility

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• I love the percussion. It's a right brain, left brain thing. There are different beats, but cooperating together. It's your whole body doing it, you're doing the snare drum and the high top with your hands and the bass drum with your foot. You're this whole motion machine.

  Shalom Harlow

  Hands, Feet, Brain

  34 Copy quote

• And this is our time-keeper, with a passion for percussion

  Leonard Cohen

  Inspiration, Passion, Keepers

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• I was able to interpret the difference between the sharp, quick sound and the slow, deep sound of percussion and manipulate it, get a third sound out of things, if the beats were rapid enough.

  Sunny Murray

  Differences, Able, Manipulation

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• Percussion music is revolution. Sound and rhythm have too long been submissive to the restrictions of nineteenth century music. Today we are fighting for their emancipation. Tomorrow, with electronic music in our ears, we will hear freedom. At the present stage of revolution, a healthy lawlessness is warranted. Experiment must necessarily be carried on by hitting anything-tin pans, rice bowls, iron pipes-anything we can lay our hands on. Not only hitting, but rubbing, scraping, making sound in every possible way...What we can't do ourselves will be done by machines which we will invent.

  John Cage

  Music, Fighting, Hands

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• The thing about playing percussion is that you can create all these emotions that can be sometimes beautiful, sometimes really ugly, or sometimes sweet, sometimes as big as King Kong and so on. And so there can be a real riot out there, or it can be so refined.

  Evelyn Glennie

  Beautiful, Sweet, Kings

  "Beat of a Different Drummer". Interview with Jeffrey Brown, www.pbs.org. June 14, 1999.

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• For me, the most difficult thing is that I am learning melodies on guitar from some songs whose melodies were not meant to be played on guitar. Ever. They were intended mostly for keyboards or melodic percussion.

  Dweezil Zappa

  Song, Guitar, Were Not Meant To Be

  54 Copy quote

• I've figured out what to do with my hands... onstage. I'm a percussion player, so I grab a tambourine as much as I can.

  Taylor Hanson

  Player, Hands, I Can

  "Taylor Hanson of Tinted Windows". Interview with Aidin Vaziri, www.sfgate.com. August 30, 2009.

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• And, you know, I think the original recording of Ravel's Bolero, probably whoever played percussion on that, will never have It played better than that.

  Buddy Rich

  Thinking, Ravel, Knows

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• Percussion is physical, as most instruments are. The body must function well in order to play the instruments well. Last year I climbed Mount Kilimanjaro.

  Evelyn Glennie

  Order, Years, Play

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• I play guitar, piano, bass and percussion.

  Teena Marie

  Guitar, Play, Piano

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• I play a percussion instrument, not a musical saw; it needs no amplification. Where it's needed, they put a microphone in front of the bass drum. But, I don't think it's necessary to play that way every night.

  Buddy Rich

  Night, Thinking, Play

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• When I lost the use of my hi-hat and bass drum legs, I became basically a singer. I was a drummer who did a bit of singing, and then I became a singer who did a bit of percussion.

  Robert Wyatt

  Hate, Singing, Use

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• Play the Piano Drunk Like a Percussion Instrument Until the Fingers Begin to Bleed a Bit.

  Charles Bukowski

  Play, Piano, Drunk

  1979 Title of book.

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• When I was 12, I happened to see a schoolmate playing percussion, and it looked interesting. I asked for lessons, and it felt right.

  Evelyn Glennie

  Interesting, Lessons, Schoolmates

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• A large part of my work has been collaborating with composers; I think we've commissioned about 140 pieces now, a lot of them percussion concertos.

  Evelyn Glennie

  Thinking, Pieces, Composer

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• I read and write classical piano and percussion, also guitar.

  Suzi Quatro

  Writing, Guitar, Piano

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• There's always something in most world folk musics that always seems connected; whether it's a bagpipe or a tambura, there's always some sort of drone instrument, and there's always percussion.

  Paul Weller

  Drones, Bagpipes, World

  Source: www.clashmusic.com

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• The Violins waltzed. The Cellos and Basses provided accompaniment. The Violas mourned their fate, while the Concertmaster showed off. The Flutes did bird imitations…repeatedly, and the reed instruments had the good taste to admire my jacket. The Trumpets held a parade in honor of our great nation, while the French Horns waxed nostalgic about something or other. The Trombones had too much to drink. The Percussion beat the band, and the Tuba stayed home playing cards with his landlady, the Harp, taking sips of warm milk a blue little cup. “But the Composer is still dead.

  Daniel Handler

  Home, Fate, Blue

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• There are two kinds of music. One comes from the strings of a guitar, the other from the strings of the heart. One sound comes from a chamber orchestra, the other from the beating of the heart's chamber. One comes from an instrument of graphite and wood, the other from an organ of flesh and blood. This loftier music I speak of tonight is more pleasing than the notes of the most gifted composers, more moving than a marching band, more harmonious than a thousand voices joined in hymn and more powerful than all the world's percussion instruments combined. That sweet sound of love.

  Michael Jackson

  Sweet, Powerful, Moving

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• The rhythm of music is very, very important for people with Parkinson's. But it's also very important with other sorts of patients, such as patients with Tourette's syndrome. Music helps them bring their impulses and tics under control. There is even a whole percussion orchestra made up exclusively of Tourette's patients.

  Oliver Sacks

  People, Important, Orchestra

  Source: www.spiegel.de

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• I have to have the reasons to make the record. There are just too many records out there, especially when it's something as audacious as a solo percussion record with solo drumming music on it. There better be a reason behind it.

  Glenn Kotche

  Records, Drumming, Reason

  Interview with Grayson Currin, pitchfork.com. June 5, 2006.

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• I have always been drawn to percussion and drums, to bass and piano, in music much more then I am drawn to the guitar and the other lead instruments.

  Dave Matthews

  Guitar, Piano, Bass

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