I spent a lot of time teaching myself theory and harmony so I could be free to express myself on the instrument.

I like Simon Cowell - look at how many great artists have come out of the U.K. because of him.

The greatest guitar player in the world today for me is Paco de Lucia, who is actually Spanish.

The melody is the most important thing that must stay in the minds of the people who listen to you. No matter how many notes you play, you can't let them forget what the song is.

People who love jazz musicians love us when we play what we want to play and we're starving. But as soon as you commercialize your sound like Wes Montgomery did, the jazz fans and the critics are down on you!

Love songs are one of the great essences of life, the only thing thats lasting.

Of course we've lost so many superstars who've made jazz what it is. We've lost so many musicians who created new things and changed the way we think about music and who took jazz to a new level. So jazz is suffering from that. But we still have a lot of incredible people playing jazz in the world. We have a lot of people leading the way.