Dope never helped anybody sing better or play music better or do anything better. All dope can do for you is kill you - and kill you the long, slow, hard way.

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

Singing songs like 'The Man I Love' or 'Porgy' is no more work than sitting down and eating Chinese roast duck, and I love roast duck.

I try to improvise like Les Young, Louis Armstrong or someone else I admire. What comes out is what I feel.

Lust may be in the heart, though it be not seen by others; as guests may be in the house, though they look not out at the windows.

I never hurt nobody but myself and that's nobody's business but my own.

A kiss that is never tasted, is forever and ever wasted.