When you sing, always tell the truth.

Love is like a faucet, it turns off and on.

In this country, don't forget, a habit is no damn private hell. There's no solitary confinement outside of jail. A habit is hell for those you love. And in this country it's the worst kind of hell for those who love you.

I never sing a song the same way twice.

People don't understand the kind of fight it takes to record what you want to record the way you want to record it.

The whole basis of my singing is feeling. Unless I feel something, I can't sing.

I think I copied my style from Louis Armstrong. Because I used to like the big volume and the big sound that Bessie Smith got when she sang ... So I liked the feeling that Louis got and I wanted the big volume that Bessie Smith got. But I found that it didn't work with me, because I didn't have a big voice. So anyway between the two of them I sorta got Billie Holiday.