My father was a jazz tenor sax player. He played in a lot of big bands. So I had that sound around me all the time. The first record that really caught my ear was Clifford Brown's 'Brownie Eyes.' I grew up listening to John Coltrane and Illinois Jacquet. This is where I come from... I love improvisational music.
Meshell NdegeocelloYou make a choice to make music or be an actor, and people automatically think they can have access to your life.
Meshell NdegeocelloWe're all just bags of bones and muscle and hormones; I'll never understand what makes our minds do the things we do. It's like that statue of the monkey holding a skull. We're trying to use a thing we don't understand to understand ourselves.
Meshell NdegeocelloOur leaders and Osama Bin Laden all claim to do the right thing in the name of God. I question that. I wonder if that God is worth the life of another human-being.
Meshell NdegeocelloOnce you encounter people who are really testing the limits of kindness, that's when you start to build up a shield and close yourself down.
Meshell Ndegeocello