Monk encouraged me to emancipate the drums from their subservient role as timekeepers.

The people who really got me off were dealing with the musical potential of their instrument.

They had all this talent, and they had no instruments. So they started rap music. They rhymed on their own. They made their own sounds and their own movements.

You can't write the same book twice. Though I've been in historical musical situations, I can't go back and do that again. And though I run into artistic crises, they keep my life interesting.

Jazz is a democratic musical form. We take our respective instruments & collectively create a thing of beauty.

Monk encouraged me to emancipate the drums from their subservient role as timekeepers.

My point is that we much decolonize our minds and re-name and re-define ourselves . . . In all respects, culturally, politically, socially, we must re-define ourselves and our lives, in our own terms.