Luther Vandross was doing fine, but he said, "Man, I want to do my own project." So he got us all to do a demo, and that demo was "Never Too Much." It took him a year and a half to get signed, because he didn't have a gimmick. The record companies were looking for his gimmick. They said, "What's your gimmick?" He said, "I sing. That's my gimmick." Anyway, he finally got signed and the record was released, and the rest was history.

It's a great thing about being a musician; you don't stop until the day you die, you can improve. So it's a wonderful thing to do.

I think jazz is a beautiful, democratic music. It encourages musicians with very strong, and many times, very different points of view to work together as a team while, at the same time, giving them the space to express their individuality. It's a very important art form and can be used as a model for different cultures to work together.

I was with Miles Davisfor a couple of years as his bass player, and it was a beautiful experience. After two years I said to him, "Listen, man, I want to leave your band." He goes, "Why?" I said, "Because I want to develop not just as a bass player, but I want to get more into composition, into producing, and I'm working with Aretha Franklin and Luther Vandross and all these guys, and I want to really see how much I can grow and develop." He actually gave me his blessing.

Miles Davis came in a couple of days and said, "Oh, man, I love that. Keep going." So he said, "Let me know when you need trumpet." And he came in, and he was sitting there, and I was very intimidated, because now he's going to play the trumpet on something that I wrote." He starts to play, and I go, "That's not right, but I don't know how to tell him it's not right." Finally he goes, "When are you going to tell me what to do?" He said, "This is your music. I know you know how it's supposed to sound. Stop fooling around. We don't have time."

Miles Davis had been in retirement for five or six years and he was coming out of retirement and he was looking for young guys. Somebody gave him my name and he called me and said, "Can you show up at Columbia Studios in two hours?" I'm like, "Whoa, is this the real Miles Davis?" He's like, "Yeah." So I showed up and yeah, it was intimidating, but music is so important to me that the intimidation was all before the notes started.

There's a lot of guys who have great technique, people practicing a lot and you hear them, but there's not that many people who when you hear them, you go, "Man, that guy must practice a lot," right? Then you hear Miles Davis play, and you go, "Man, I had a girlfriend like that." That's a whole another level of musicianship.