Jazz is not just music, it's a way of life, it's a way of being, a way of thinking. . . . the new inventive phrases we make up to describe things - all that to me is jazz just as much as the music we play.

What is love but a prelude to sorrow...with heartache ahead for your goal.

I tell you what freedom is to me: no fear.

I feel what they feel. And people who listen to me know that, and it makes them feel like they're not alone.

I believe in racial memory too. I'm sure I've got ancient African blood in me that has something to do with what I am.

I think the rich are too rich and the poor are too poor. I don't think the black people are going to rise at all; I think most of them are going to die.

The pressure of show business is on all the time and show business is a fickle business. Whatever is popular now - that's all that counts. I have to constantly re-identify myself to myself, reactivate my own standards, my own convictions about what I'm doing and why.