In the middle 1940s... I heard everyone live. Painting, the theater; everything was happening. It was an exciting time when New York was the place to be.
Bill Dixon

While everyone has a right to his or her opinion, the people who are informed have more of a right.
Bill Dixon

My career has been different from most people, but I knew what I was not going to do. I knew I was not going to be controlled. I knew there was a price for this, but I did not know there was as large a price as it turned out to be.
Bill Dixon

I have no distributor... it is indicative to me that there are these pockets of players and collectors all over. You should see the correspondence I get from over the world letting me know how significant they think I am. I know that wherever I go, I am well received.
Bill Dixon

The magic of playing has to do with how much everyone wants it to succeed. If you have five players in a situation where the music is being improvised and one is determined it is not going to succeed, it won't succeed even if one of the musicians takes control.
Bill Dixon

Whether I get adequate attention or not, people here do know the work I have been doing systematically and without compromise for over 40 years. I get tired of people making excuses for guys who don't continue the art because they can't make a living.
Bill Dixon

Whatever I do, I attempt to do it fully. I try, and don't always succeed, to be thorough. There are musicians who do not know their worth, and if they knew it at one time, it has eluded them. I know my worth. You try not to dwell in the past.
Bill Dixon

Rock musicians, and a vast array of popular-music musicians, due to their wealth, acquired through the mass of their notoriety, are able to be listened to and heard and thus are able to effect change on an international level.
Bill Dixon