You can't be afraid of failure and you can't be afraid of success, because either one gets in the way of your work.

I'm an exhibitionist, I was an exhibitionist as a kid.

And then adds with a laugh, 'but in retrospect I think he may have been more sophisticated than we were.'

If you asked anybody in my family, they would have very stridently proclaimed themselves middle class. My mother and father were separated, so he doesn't count.

If I do a piece in my living room, if I practice it - and I have the tapes to prove this - it's not going to be as good as doing the same piece in front of an audience.

I cut myself off from the mainstream of jazz. It stood me in good stead later on, as a musician.

There is an apprenticeship system in jazz. You teach the young ones. So even if the musicians weren't personally that likable, they felt an obligation to help the younger musicians.