You are what you repeatedly do when things get hard.

Give it up for Ray Charles and his beautiful legacy. And thank you, Ray Charles, for living.

I'm a southern gentleman.

Man, after all my grandma put into me learning the piano, that was a hard day, telling her I was telling jokes for a living.

Black people are the most talented people in the world.

To be the leading man it's about the celebrity and the looks, and it's tough to do that. People who do it great are people like Tom Cruise and Will Smith - they're built for that. I ain't. I'm more of a character guy.

I went to college on a classical piano scholarship. My grandmother made me practice one full hour a day. Every day. Man. I thought all she wanted was for me not to have any fun. Next thing you know, you have a career in music. Now, not everybody's going to go on and be Mozart or Michael Jackson. But music makes you smarter.