Les Paul Quotes & Sayings

We go in there and we work on altering those ideas and in many cases go in different directions. — Les Paul

If I have to go around telling everyone how great I am, then there's something wrong with my act. — Les Paul

Paint pictures with sound. First, find your white-the deepest, roundest sound you can play on the guitar. Then, find your black-which is the most extreme tonal difference from white you can play. Now, just pick the note where you've got white, pick it where you've got black, and then find all those colors in between. Get those colors down, and you'll be able to express almost any emotion on the guitar.? — Les Paul

I never stop being amazed by all the different ways of playing the guitar and making it deliver a message. — Les Paul

Every setback might be the very thing that makes you carry on and fight all the harder and become much better. — Les Paul

There are times when you want to go where you used to go and you can't go there. — Les Paul

My chops were not as fast ... [but] I just learned more on what was in my mind than what was in my chops. I learned a long time ago that one note can go a long way if it's the right one, and it will probably whip the guy with twenty notes — Les Paul

It's not jazz as we know jazz here in America. — Les Paul

Now I need to take a piece of wood and make it sound like the railroad track, but I also had to make it beautiful and lovable so that a person playing it would think of it in terms of his mistress, a bartender, his wife, a good psychiatrist - whatever. — Les Paul

I used my mother's radio as a PA system. I'd take the telephone, the speaking part, and take those two leads off and lead them into the radio and the sound would come out of the speaker. — Les Paul

You can't go to the store and buy a good ear and rhythm. — Les Paul

I wanted something very dense, something that would sustain long and more pieces of wood that would be soft, sweet, for more of a mellow sound. — Les Paul

As far as I'm concerned, I'm just a guitar player, and my job is to go out there and play and entertain and do my thing. — Les Paul

One minute we're over here, the next minute we're doing something completely different. But it's interesting because you are producing so many things you couldn't do with analog. — Les Paul

If you're in the U.S. and talk to someone on the phone who's in Iraq, you'll experience sound delay. It isn't long, but the sound has to go to a satellite and back, it's used for everything. I'm proud to have that be something I invented. — Les Paul

I have younger friends who don't work, and they aren't doing so well. My secret is to keep going, keep working. — Les Paul

A guitar is something you can hold and love and it's never going to bug you. But here's the secret about the guitar - it's defiant. It will never let you conquer it. The more you get involved with it, the more you realize how little you know. — Les Paul

No, working is what will keep you alive. — Les Paul

You learn fast from others how to be an entertainer as well as a musician; you don't necessarily have to get out there and just play - you can be an entertainer, too. — Les Paul

The audience, they're not professionals. They just love music. It isn't necessary to play over their heads to be admired. — Les Paul

I don't know of a guitar player that has only one guitar. They're never happy with one. I'm never happy with just one of them. I woke up and ended up with six, even if you can only play one at a time! — Les Paul

This guitar is such a pal. It's a psychiatrist. It's a doggone bartender. It's a housewife. This guy is everything. Whenever I find that I've got a problem, I'll go pick my guitar up and play. It's the greatest pal in the whole world. — Les Paul

To this day, no one has come up with a set of rules for originality. There aren't any. — Les Paul

When I got my first guitar my fingers wouldn't go to the sixth string so I took off the big E and played with just five strings. I was only 6 or 7. — Les Paul

When you just get mixed up & there's too much going on, then it's time to pick up your guitar. — Les Paul

Of the whole bunch of guys who play hollow body guitar, I think Herb Ellis has the most drive — Les Paul

The guitar is just a wonderful instrument. It's everything: a bartender, a psychiatrist, a housewife. It's everything, but it's elusive — Les Paul

Wanted to create music that was so different that my mother could tell me from anyone else — Les Paul