There are two people that probably influenced me more than anybody out of all the artists out here: that's Nick Ashford and Valerie Simpson.

I'm a lot more sensitive about music, I think, than most other guys in this particular side of the business. Most of them are beat crazy and beat heavy. I'm more melody. I'm more musical than most of the other ones.

I am definitely in the right place doing the right thing. These are the rewards.

There are two people that probably influenced me more than anybody out of all the artists out here: that's Nick Ashford and Valerie Simpson.

When you create something out of nothing it's the most thrilling thing.

I used to tell myself when I was much younger that I didn't want to wake up one day and be 32 years old and still playing records. It's just not going to happen. Well, the joke is on me, because I'm 56 years old now.

The first job I got when I was in high school was working for a department store in New York. I worked in the stockroom. That's when I learned that I couldn't work for anyone else, because I was spoken to in a way that I wasn't spoken to at home.