Quincy Jones
Quincy Jones
Quincy Delightt Jones, Jr., also known as "Q", is an American record producer, conductor, arranger, composer, musician, television producer, film producer, instrumentalist, magazine founder, entertainment company executive, and humanitarian. His career spans six decades in the entertainment industry and a record 79 Grammy Award nominations, 28 Grammys, including a Grammy Legend Award in 1991...
NationalityAmerican
ProfessionMusic Producer
Date of Birth14 March 1933
CityChicago, IL
CountryUnited States of America
A song should have all the color and beauty of every rose.
Hell, nobody knows where jazz is going to go. There may be a kid right now in Chitlin Switch, Georgia, who is going to come along and upset everybody.
If architecture is frozen music then music must be liquid architecture.
Louis 'Thunder Thumbs' Johnson was one of the greatest bass players to ever pick up the instrument, as a member of the Brothers Johnson, we shared decades of magical times working together in the studio and touring the world. From my albums 'Body Heat' and 'Mellow Madness,' to their platinum albums 'Look Out for #1,' 'Right On Time,' 'Blam' and 'Light Up the Night,' which I produced, to Michael's solo debut 'Off the Wall,' I considered Louis a core member of my production team. He was a dear and beloved friend and brother, and I will miss his presence and joy of life every day.
Billy Strayhorn wrote Multicolored Blue. Billy to me is the boss of the arrangers.
To me it's no accident that all the symphony orchestras around the world tune up to the note A. And A is 440 cycles, except in Germany where it's 444. But the universe is 450 cycles. So what I'm trying to say is, I think it's God's voice, melody especially. Counterpoint, retrograde inversion, harmony... that's the science and the craft.
When you're over the hill, that's when you pick up speed.
The climate in the '50s and '60s for black performers or black people in the entertainment business was atrocious. It was atrocious.
Thank God, 50 years ago I learned that a great song, our entire business is all based on two things; a great song and a great story. Film, television, if you don't have that story, nothing else matters. You don't call anybody else or direct anybody. The same with a song. A great song can make the worst singer in the world a star.
I found this out over the years, that racism is a thinly veiled disguise over economics and money. It really is.
I got a scholarship to Seattle University and I was writing arrangements for singers and everybody. But the music course was too dry and I really wanted to get away from home.
I got in the school band and the school choir. It all hit me like a ton of bricks, everything just came out. I played percussion for a while, and stayed after school forever just tinkering around with different things, the clarinets and the violins.
I was inspired by a lot of people when I was young. Every band that came through town, to the theater, or the dance hall. I was at every dance, every night club, listened to every band that came through, because in those days we didn't have MTV, we didn't have television.
You cannot get an A if you're afraid of getting an F.