You play ensemble things that you had no idea you were going to play two minutes before.

A lot of jazz is like that; it sells over a period of time.

Music is very important. It's important as a tool for learning, it can be a tool for healing, it can be no telling what, as long as we remain free to be able to create the music, to be able to experiment and to really research, and to really get time to develop the music.

Jazz is so difficult. A lot of people think once they've learned these licks they can get up and play them for the rest of their life. But that's not being truthful to the music 'cause it's not developing. Cats you hear that don't make no mistakes? They ain't trying to do nothing. everything they hear is on the mark, but they've played it so many times... I've built a whole career out of making mistakes!

What I've been trying to do for years is to get the music played on a station other than jazz stations, you know, to expand the audience.

Many times you never know what's going to happen. You'll play songs that you never thought you were going to play.

We expect the listener to have, like, a movie going on when they hear us. That's what it's all about for us.