A Quote by Quincy Jones

Few rappers realize the genre sprang from West African griots through Delta slave songs to jazz poetry and the comedic trash talk of 'the dozens.'

Quincy Jones

Quote Topics

Poetry African Comedic Delta Dozens Few Genre Jazz Rappers Realize Slave Songs Talk Through Trash Trash Talk West West Africa

Quote Author

Quincy Jones
American - Musician
Born: March 14, 1933

The common root, of course, comes out of Africa. That's the pulse.The African pulse. It's all the way back from . . . the old slave chants and up through the blues, the jazz, and up through rock. And it's all got the African pulse.

Duke Ellington

Lawrence Hill, a cultural and spiritual descendant of West African griots, has used his vast storytelling talents to create an epic story that spans three continents. The Book of Negroes recites the pain, misery and liberation of one African woman, Aminata Diallo, who was stolen from her homeland and sold into American slavery. Through Aminata, Hill narrates the terrifying story of slavery and puts at the centre a female experience of the African Diaspora. I wept upon reading this story. The Book of Negroes is courageous, breathtaking, simply brilliant.

Afua Cooper

Africans in the United States must remember that the slave ships brought no West Indians, no Caribbeans, no Jamaicans or Trinidadians or Barbadians to this hemisphere. The slave ships brought only African people and most of us took the semblance of nationality from the places where slave ships dropped us off.

John Henrik Clarke

I'm in Delta Delta Delta, otherwise known as Tri-Delta. I've developed some great friendships, and it's enabled me to have a little bit more of a normal college experience.

Meryl Davis

When it comes to African Americans and African American actors, Hollywood has always felt that if you can make us laugh, that's fine, but we don't need to see you do a 'Schindler's List,' where there's no jokes or music or comedic through-line.

Hill Harper

Everybody gets all worked up about trash talk but it is what it is - it's talk... You ask any player, honestly, if trash talk's gonna affect how hard they play, because if a little trash talk affects how hard they can play, it just lets us know that they were holding back or weren't playing harder or as hard as they could.

Jason Babin

I visited New York in '63, intending to move there, but I noticed that what I valued about jazz was being discarded. I ran into `out-to-lunch' free jazz, and the notion that groove was old-fashioned. All around the United States, I could see jazz becoming linear, a horn-player's world. It made me realize that we were not jazz musicians; we were territory musicians in love with all forms of African-American music. All of the musicians I loved were territory musicians, deeply into blues and gospel as well as jazz.

Joe Sample

My songs were influenced not so much by poetry on the page but by poetry being recited by the poets who recited poems with jazz bands.

Bob Dylan

I do love science fiction, but it's not really a genre unto itself; it always seems to merge with another genre. With the few movies I've done, I've ended up playing with genre in some way or another, so any genre that's made to mix with others is like candy to me. It allows you to use big, mythic situations to talk about ordinary things.

Rian Johnson

Honestly, I don't like trash talk, because we gonna fight anyways, right? We don't need to trash talk.

Amanda Nunes

Edward Said talks about Orientalism in very negative terms because it reflects the prejudices of the west towards the exotic east. But I was also having fun thinking of Orientalism as a genre like Cowboys and Indians is a genre – they’re not an accurate representation of the American west, they’re like a fairy tale genre.

Craig Thompson

You guys are always going off about how much money you have. Do you realize what's going on in this world right now?' All these black rappers? African rappers? Talking about how much money they have. Do you realize what's going on in Africa right now? It's just like, you guys are disgusting. Talking about billions and billions of dollars you have. And spending it frivolously, when you know, the Motherland is suffering beyond belief right now.

Asher Roth

"Jazz" to begin with, is a really bad word... all the true musicians that really play jazz, jazz is the worst word for it. Jazz is a process. Jazz is a creative process. It's not so much a genre, but a way of expression.

Eldar Djangirov

When I began, poetry was very academic. You published little pamphlets from fancy presses. It was rather... chaste. There wasn't much public reading. Then there was poetry and jazz, which I don't think worked, though I love jazz.

John Fuller

Draymond's always talking trash, and he's really good at getting you off your game. He's one of the guys that he'll talk trash, even when you're playing golf. He will knock you off your game... But when you see his swing, you're like, 'How do you talk trash so well, and your swing's this bad?'