Our upright wasn't much of a piano — it was a half-step flat the entire time we owned it — but that piano was everything to me. It was dark mahogany, almost black, with rouge crimps all over it. I took about eight piano lessons before my teacher gave up on me. I loved boogie-woogie and hillbilly music and gospel too much.

Allen Toussaint

Categorized in : Entertainment

My music is homegrown from the garden of New Orleans. Music is everything to me short of breathing. Music also has a role to lift you up - not to be escapist but to take you out of misery.

Allen Toussaint

breathing new-orleans garden

To get to New Orleans you don't pass through anywhere else. That geographical location, being aloof, lets it hold onto the ritual of its own pace more than other places that have to keep up with the progress.

Allen Toussaint

progress new-orleans pace

And do respect the women of the world; remember you all had mothe... by Allen Toussaint

And do respect the women of the world; remember you all had mothers.

Allen Toussaint

mother remembers-you remember-you

Whenever I wrote songs - particularly back then - it would always... by Allen Toussaint

Whenever I wrote songs - particularly back then - it would always be for a particular artist.

Allen Toussaint

particular artist song

To play with a band all of the time, just about nightly, was good for me because I wrote lots of arrangements and I got a lot of my transposition and chords ironed out.

Allen Toussaint

chords band play

As an early child, I tried to play every kind of music that I heard. I thought everyone was doing that.

Allen Toussaint

kind play children

As a young child, I thought that all pianists played everything. I mean, I thought anything on piano - any piano music, all pianists played it.

Allen Toussaint

piano-music mean children

I never planned on being a live performer. My whole forte was about being in the studio, producing, playing the piano on recording sessions. I was all about the studio.

Allen Toussaint

forte piano performers

When you're playing live, those people who you're trying to please and reach, they're right there giving you feedback. And you don't get that feedback in the studio.

Allen Toussaint

trying giving people

To travel and to get around different places, especially in station wagons, you could really see America.

Allen Toussaint

wagons different america

The mother-in-laws themselves weren't natural jokes but most come... by Allen Toussaint

The mother-in-laws themselves weren't natural jokes but most comedians used to use that.

Allen Toussaint

comedian law mother