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

As far as I'm concerned, the essentials of jazz are: melodic improvisation, melodic invention, swing, and instrumental personality.

There's a few tunes of mine that don't have jokes, but most of them have a joke and they have a humorous point of view somewhere.

My dad was a self-taught stride piano player. The myth is - I don't whether it's true or not - that he taught himself to play by watching a player piano.

Everybody cryin' mercy / When they don't know the meaning of the word.

The idea was I'd never amount to anything in music, The theme there was that I was talented, but I wouldn't work hard enough to do anything with it.

And Lennie Tristano I like a lot, I still like him.