As a singer, I float around. I'm kind of scatty, bouncing around a lot. I try to adapt to what's going on around me in the song and the arrangement.

When you have that first flash of what you think is going to be a great idea-from the mouth, from the hands-that's an amazing feeling. I don't think anything's quite as good as that.

I returned to upstate NY where I just laid in bed for days with a fever that just wouldn't go away. After more of this, I grew increasingly sure that this was not simply the flu!

I definitely dislike pomposity and artifice. I hope that I'm not that. Once I write a song, it belongs to the world, and the way people perceive it, it's cool.

Yes, I travel in unusual circles. George Osborne and his wife Frances are my cousins.

The biggest honor of my career was when I won R&B Artist of the Year back in the 1970s. I look at that as a major honor.

I never felt entitled to anything. I'm the hardest worker I know.