Words matter. These are the best Norman Granz Quotes, and they’re great for sharing with your friends.
To play today in London, next week in Madrid and the week after that in Warsaw is a bit better than playing Newark and Baltimore and Philadelphia. I’ve been doing that for 20 years.
I’m talking as a professional impresario. I’m not judging anybody at all.
Ella can work nightclubs that Duke might not be able to work, because of having the big band. Where they go now is strictly a matter of their own names and talents.
When I was doing jazz concerts in America, I would use the biggest names I could find.
My juices needed restoring. I needed a sabbatical from the record business.
For years, Jazz At The Philharmonic albums were the only ones of their kind.
I’m concerned with trend. I don’t know where jazz fans will come from 20 years from now.
My function at Verve was that of a genuine producer in artists and repertoire.
I don’t know who’s 18 years old today that, 20 years hence, is going to be a jazz fan.
In 1958, I decided that I was going to live in Europe permanently. So in 1959 I moved to Lugano, Switzerland.
You will always find a few people in any area that would like things done completely their way.
I don’t want to sound as if I’m doing something tremendously special. But I am a jazz fan.
There are very few groups that really stay together. The leaders of groups make enough money to be able to afford to work a maximum of 35-40 weeks a year.
The record companies are interested in the kind of sales they can get from the rock groups.
The history of all big jazz bands shows was, first they played for dancing, and then they played for singing.
I still continue to do at least four concert tours a year, and in many cases, as many as six.
Jazz was uplifted by what I did.
The economic picture in the States today doesn’t allow for jazz concerts in a tour fashion. People now are too used to the Festival, which gives them more names for the same price.
Sponsors and networks will really go all out and simply evaluate people on the basis of talent.
The public, hearing pop music, is, without knowing it, also soaking up jazz.
Germany is probably the richest country in Western Europe. Yet they wouldn’t take any television with Duke and Ella, their reaction being that people weren’t interested in it.
I don’t think I will ever do any tours again in the United States. I rather think that that’s over with.
