We're not like pop musicians who have to perform the same top ten tunes every night of a tour.

I don't believe that a lot of the things I hear on the air today are going to be played for as long a time as Coleman Hawkins records or Brahms concertos.

I am the worlds laziest writer.

I believe in using the entire piano as a single instrument capable of expressing every possible musical idea.

If the average jazz artist uses his head and at the outset of his career realizes he won't play as well at fifty as he does at twenty-five, he won't be in a line-up outside the Salvation Army when he's fifty.

Some people try to get very philosophical and cerebral about what they're trying to say with jazz. You don't need any prologues, you just play. If you have something to say of any worth then people will listen to you.

We're not like pop musicians who have to perform the same top ten tunes every night of a tour.