George Shearing Quotations

Having a set, popular formula does inhibit you.

I think it was Duke Ellington who once said that we're always most pleased with our current record. I mean, you have to assume that you learn from one, and you do something better next time.

I think in certain areas the demand is greater than it has ever been, and my business is better than it's been in 30 years. The music business is so precarious, as you know-you've got to make it while you can make it, and that's exactly what we're doing.

Teddy Wilson, I think, said a little while ago that it's much easier to come in and play whatever comes into your mind, without obeying any of the laws of bass line and harmony and so on.

I was born in London in 1919. I first went to America in 1946 for a three-month holiday. Then I came back, worked here for almost a year sold up my home and went back on immigration in 1947.

All my musical foundations go back to the age of 3. My family tell me that I used to listen to the old crystal set, then go to the piano and pick out the tune that I just heard.

I don't think you can contrive any sound.

I studied with a blind teacher from about 5 until I was 16, at two different schools. From the age of 12 until 16, I was in a boarding school-which, I believe, at that time was compulsory for blind children.

We're travelling for about nine-and-a-half months a year.

Can anybody be given creativity? No. Only equipment to develop it if it's in them in the first place.