Negative people often tend to create negative cultures whereas positive corporate cultures are created by positive people.

Sometimes I say to my students, "We get to come and listen to our favorite recordings and try to learn from them and emulate that and hopefully we can inspire other people the way we've been inspired."

Now we also need people who just love to listen to the music. And we need people that want to work to facilitate it. That want to do work, have somebody like Bret Primack, the jazz video guy.

Hearing Phil [wood] a lot, those few years especially when I was going to hear music and Tom Harrell was in the band. Man that was incredible. Hearing Tom at that period, and hearing Phil in that period, and also [Charles] McPherson. Those three guys were very impactful. Very inspiring to me at the time.

I finally got to junior high and I got to start saxophone. There were a few of us that were in the beginner band in sixth grade that made it to the advanced band, which was called the morning band at our junior high school in Staten Island.

[My mother told me] stories about Nat King Cole, and Miles Davis, and seeing pictures in later years with band leaders like Alvino Ray.

The streets weren't paved with gold and Rose petals [when I was young]. "Do I have a horn to sell this month to pay my rent, or what am I going to do?" It was what it was.