Some of [drummers] drop time because they want to hear what you're doin'.

It's a different ballgame now, so that lets [teo] Macero out. He's always complainin', always sick.

It took me twenty years study and practice to work up to what I wanted to play in this performance. How can she expect to listen five minutes and understand it?

The reason [drummers] call things "unison", and they sound unison, is because you actually play two different tempos . . . like you're a little sharp, or a little flat; it's so slight that they call it "unison", but it's not unison.

I gave the album [You're Under Arrest] to Quincy Jones and he loved "D Train". We couldn't call it "D Train"; it's called "MDI/Something's On Your Mind/MD2". That's on the album.

Audiences - they like colour, you know. I can go out there wearing a red suit, man, and they'll say I'm out of sight ... I think they should be educated; you should always drop something on an audience ... When you get in front of an audience, you should try to give 'em something. After all, they're there looking at you like this. You can't go out and give 'em nothing.

If you got up on the bandstand at Minton's and couldn't play, you were not only going to be embarrassed by the people ignoring you or booing you, you might get your ass kicked.