I lost my mother when I was 7, I watched her being taken away in a strait jacket to a mental hospital, that’s something you never forget
—so, I said to myself, “I don’t have a mother, I’m going to let music be my mother”
— Quincy Jones 
 
Quincy Jones left us a week ago. It was no surprise that a man whose middle name was “Delight” should have delighted us for many years—as composer, songwriter, arranger, producer, trumpeter and film soundtrack creator, a multi-talented man, a music man across genres, across generations, across geniuses, from George Benson to Frank Sinatra to Michael Jackson—a real Renaissance man. When Quincy was young, he almost chose a life of crime, thinking that gangsters made money--better sense and a trumpet in his hand prevailed and he was hooked. 

I remember first hearing of Quincy Jones, dancing to Michael Jackson’s “Don’t Stop Till You Get Enough” at a college social in 1979. MJ created grooves that made even “two left feet” exponents dance. You just got up and bopped regardless.  The song, the opening track of his album, Off the Wall, had a very strong violin section, the quartet of violinists, giving the groove an almost classical overlay. Going through videos, on the day the great man passed,  it amused me no end when Quincy narrated that Michael Jackson wrote him a letter “requesting” him to remove the violins. “They’re coming in the way of my groove”, Michael wrote. “And did you remove them?” the interviewer asked. Quincy was astonished at this question, “Are you kidding me! No way was I removing them, they made the opening of the song so catchy!” The rest is musical history as the song went straight to number one and the record sold over 20 million copies, making it one of the biggest selling albums of all time.