George Shearing
George Shearing
Sir George Shearing, OBEwas a British jazz pianist who for many years led a popular jazz group that recorded for Discovery Records, MGM Records and Capitol Records. The composer of over 300 titles, including the jazz standard "Lullaby of Birdland", had multiple albums on the Billboard charts during the 1950s, 1960s, 1980s and 1990s. He died of heart failure in New York City, at the age of 91...
NationalityBritish
ProfessionPianist
Date of Birth13 August 1919
applied learn music piece sit
I have never applied myself to learn a piece of music away from the instrument. I sit down at the piano, read a bar, then play it.
build enjoy establish
If you establish an identity, you build a monster-and that's right, you've got to live with it. Of course, you can enjoy it, too.
music dog people
When people ask me how is it I was a musician, I facetiously say that I'm a firm believer in reincarnation and in a previous life I was Johann Sebastian Bach's guide dog.
music tired years
I always tell people, it took me 10 minutes and 35 years in the business. I get tired of playing it ["Lullaby of Birdland"], but not of collecting the royalties.
writing firsts notes
In Braille you write your flat sign first and then your note.
couple thinking piano
I haven't written an awful lot recently, but I think I probably will start again very shortly. Being so much on the road, when you have a couple of weeks off, you're likely to avoid sitting at the piano, and taping, and giving yourself more work to do.
night play rays
When Hank Jones had his night off, I would get somebody to take my place as intermission pianist and I'd play the show with Ella, so I would get a chance to play with Ray Brown and Charlie Smith as well.
identity monsters enjoy
If you establish an identity, you build a monster-and thats right, youve got to live with it. Of course, you can enjoy it, too.
music creativity firsts
Can anybody be given creativity? No. Only equipment to develop it if it's in them in the first place.
journey years nine
We're travelling for about nine-and-a-half months a year.
perfect question suppose
Perfect retention. I don't think I could do that-I've never disciplined myself to do it.I suppose a lot of it is a question of discipline. Which improvisation is not.
anybody degree develop equipment given great
Can anybody be given a great degree of creativity? No. They can be given the equipment to develop it-if they have it in them in the first place.
age blind boarding compulsory studied teacher time until
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.
age crystal family musical piano pick tune
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.