Wynton Marsalis is jazzy the same way someone who drives a BMW is sporty.

... The 'cleverness' syndrome has taken the place of melody. It's like everyone has come down with this terrible disease in jazz....you are always expected to do your own material, which is a strange thing to do if you're a poor composer but a great player.

It is the individual voice, present to itself, that needs to be heard. We need to hear the process of the musician working on himself. We don't need to hear who is more clever with synthesizers. Our cleverness has created the world we live in, which in many ways, we're sorry about.

We accept so many things that come through the media; we get used to them, however vigilant we are. But for any creative art, you have to remain 110% conscious, and in a world that's losing consciousness, that's getting harder.

I grew up with the piano. I learned its language as I learned to speak.

Music always turns into music. As soon as I play a key, push a key down, there's no theory any more. When I go and I hear a sound on the keyboard, all theories go out the window.

I actually get a metallic taste in my mouth when I think about electric music.