So many people dwell on negativity and I've survived by ignoring it: it dims your light and it's harder each time to turn the power up again.

Concert dance is the hardest kind of dance. We tour constantly, around the world, year in and year out. It just doesn't work for everybody. It's the lifestyle, it's the stamina, it's the love, it's the dedication, it's the commitment, it's all those words.

Maybe its a generational thing, but I never wanted to be the best black dancer in the world. I just wanted to be the best.

Dancing is being trusted with other people's guts; choreographing is trusting other people with yours. When I choreograph I'm giving a dancer something to do and trusting the dancer to do it and build on it.

I was a protege; by the age of 10, I was studying with ballet choreographer Anthony Tudor in a class of adults.

I want people to have their own visions for the dance. Some generations will sit back and relate to the music. And the young people ...they'll have the dance right in front of them.

If you look at a dancer in silence, his or her body will be the music. If you turn the music on, that body will become an extension of what you're hearing.