So I had a couple of years of playing trumpet. I really enjoyed it, but it was not the kind of instrument you could whip out at a party. Let's face it.

But when you know that you've got a real friend somewhere, suddenly all the others are so much easier to bear.

I've also gotten to play in front of a million people in Central Park when there was a grass roots movement calling for nuclear disarmament - it was about 1982 - they called it Peace Sunday.

I taught myself to play the piano, because I wanted to play it.

Caught between the longing for love, and the struggle for the legal tender, where the sirens sing and the church bells ring, and the junk man pounds his fender. Where the veterans dream of the fight, fast asleep at the traffic light, and the children solemnly wait for the ice cream vendor.

The kid I was when I first left home Was looking for his freedom and a life of his own But the freedom that he found wasn't quite as sweet When the truth was known I have prayed for America I was made for America I can't let go till she comes around Until the land of the free Is awake and can see And until her conscience has been found.

I never was a very good singer.