“I like to make records sound good. I'm more like a reducer than a producer. If an artist cannot produce themselves, what's the point?”
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If you're going to use standards as criteria for signing musicians, you can sign thousands. If you're going to use some sort of conceptual interpretation that's based on the tradition of those standards, but is trying to move away from it, you're down to about 10 people or so.
Branford Marsalis 
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The biggest problem with American music right now, is that kids don't listen. They come by it honestly, Americans don't listen anyway. When people go to concerts, they say I'm going to see... not, I'm going to hear.
Branford Marsalis
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Pop doesn't really look back. It can't. What makes pop work is simplicity.
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The piano is the X factor. People have a tough time following the structures when there's no piano there, spelling it out. It makes it more easily understood, particularly to people who don't know as much about music.
Branford Marsalis
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I gave up my base in popular culture when I left the Tonight Show.
Branford Marsalis
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