KIPPIE MOEKETSI

I also read music books. I would say it is the Ortolandi that taught me music. I learnt to play the clarinet with a saxophone book. 'Strue, that's how I taught myself music. I can still play the clarinet. I didn'y practice how to play the saxophone, I just play it. Yah, one you know a clarinet, a saxophone is a boy. . . Those olden days, you wouldn't play in a band if you could not read music. Unlike today, where you just play. That's why I don't like today's music. I don't say I'm condemning it. I don't say it is backward. In fact, some of today's musicians are good. The trouble with them is that they are too commercial. The talent scout tells them, "Don't play jazz because the audience don'y like it." You understand what I'm trying to say. . . The Jazz Epistles was the best band I ever played in, here in South Africa.

- Kippie Moeketsi, "Kippie's Memories", Staffrider, November 1981.