Abbey Lincoln – Quotes

I was looking for

I was looking for the people who were making the music inside the cabinet. I would look in there and see if I could find somebody who was making all this wonderful music.
Abbey Lincoln

There are men and women still on the streets, and that’s all they are saying Can you spare a quarter? I come from a crowd of people who were current on the outlook on life, who were social and knew where they were and had some input into how things seemed to be.
Abbey Lincoln

But I’ve been there

But I’ve been there and done that. I’m not trying to prove anything to anybody, and if somebody wants me to come, if they can afford what I ask, it’s not as much as Madonna makes; not that I want what Madonna makes, but I was saying.
Abbey Lincoln

It’s a spirit that

It’s a spirit that was given me and the relationships and meeting all these great people, Duke Ellington, Louis Armstrong; through Max I met a lot of people too. My first album was with Benny Carter.
Abbey Lincoln

We have inherited a

We have inherited a great music. This music is a holdover. It comes with us like the skin, the texture of our hair. It’s our memory banks.
Abbey Lincoln

I don’t have to

I don’t have to lay on the couch and see a therapist because my therapist is in my paint brushes.
Abbey Lincoln

I was in New

I was in New York, miserable because I was working supper clubs but I wasn’t expressing myself. I was really unhappy with my life. I saw Max Roach again and he told me I didn’t have to do things like that. He made me an honest woman on the stage. I have been performing in that tradition since. I feel that I’m a serious performer now whereas then I wanted to be but I didn’t know how.
Abbey Lincoln

I was looking for

But I’ve been there

It’s a spirit that

We have inherited a

I don’t have to

I was in New

I think that’s what

You can never loose

I am the first