I've gone through so much in my life. I should have been dead a long time ago, but I am still here, and I'm the happiest I've ever been.

See, I don't like places where people can't dance - don't like clubs or theatres where a bunch of bourgeois people sit around tip, tip, tipping their fingers.

People that can't stand to listen to the blues, they've got to be phonies.

When Malcolm X was assassinated I was working at the Apollo. They brought his body to the Unity Funeral Home, which was around the corner.

It's the same thing now. When I go onstage the young people scream and holler as much as the older generation.

And as I started reaching deeper I realized that most of the blues of that day was done by men. Women just didn't have the nerve.

Jazz took too much discipline. You have to come in at the right place, which is different than me singing the blues, where I can sing, 'Oh, baby,' if there's a pause in the melody. With jazz, you better leave that space open, or put in something real cool.