I can understand why some of these drummers and bass players become cult figures with all of their equipment and the incredible amount of technique they have. But there's very little that I think satisfies you intellectually or emotionally.

You need, as a historian, essential triangulation from your subject and the only way you get that triangulation is through time.

Write: write letters. Keep journals. Besides your children, there is no surer way of achieving immortality.

History is malleable. A new cache of diaries can shed new light, and archeological evidence can challenge our popular assumptions.

I have made all my films for my children with the exception of my first film because my oldest daughter wasn't born when I was making the film about the Brooklyn Bridge.

History isn't really about the past - settling old scores. It's about defining the present and who we are.

I treat the photograph as a work of great complexity in which you can find drama. Add to that a careful composition of landscapes, live photography, the right music and interviews with people, and it becomes a style.