People have often said to me, 'You're so relaxed when you play.' Relaxed my elbow. It's practice.

It takes the black keys and the white keys both, to make perfect harmony.

Too many young musicians today want to win polls before they learn their instruments.

I don't have any great love for Chicago. What the hell, a childhood around Douglas Park isn't very memorable. I remember the street fights and how you were afraid to cross the bridge 'cause the Irish kid on the other side would beat your head in. I left Chicago a long time ago.

If a guy's got it, let him give it. I'm selling music, not prejudice.

Some of the guys I played with .. didn't go around learning more about their instruments from an intellectual point of view. All they wanted was to play hot jazz, and the instrument was just a means. I'd imagine that a lot of them criticized me-said my technique was too good. Something like that. But I've always wanted to know what made music. How you do it, and why it sounds good. I always practiced, worked like hell.

Sometimes when you start losing detail, whether it's in music or in life, something as small as failing to be polite, you start to lose substance.