I think play and joy and feeling good deserve more of our time. I don't see why adults are supposed to grow out of those things. If I have a mission it's to make everyone who comes to my concerts leave feeling a heightened sense of freedom to play, sing, and enjoy themselves.

Seriously though, my father was the first African American to sign a contract with the Metropolitan Opera so I grew up with classical music and jazz in the home all the time.

In every life we have some trouble, but when you worry you make it double. Don't worry. Be happy.

My biggest musical influences are probably my parents.

I don't want anything to get in the way of me and my singing. I want my mind as clear as possible.

I prepared five songs, I sang them, and he hired me. I started working about a month later at the piano bar.

Improvisation means coming to the situation without rigid expectations or preconceptions. The key to improvisation is motion — you keep going forward, fearful or not, living from moment to moment. That’s how life is.