I went through the whole number, you know. The swing era, the boogie woogie era, the bebop era. Thelonious Monk is still one of my favorites. So a lot of these people had their effect on me.

I do some concerts. At the moment, I'm being helped a lot by a gig I play in London, which is Pizza Express.

I do very few standards. Hardly any. Other people's tunes that I do are usually obscure tunes, for the most part, although I do a couple of Duke Ellington tunes that are well known.

The jazz boom was goin' on then so there was a lot happenin' in New York at that time.

I sang and wrote songs when I was 12 years old.

I'm always storing away phrases and ideas and things that I think might turn into songs.

You always want to write the perfect song. But no one will ever write the perfect song, I guess. I would just like to write on that has all the elements of what I'm tring to do. And I'm working on it. I'm always working on it.