Every country can be defined through their food, their music and their language. That's the soul of a country.

It was messed up, because in 1947 my family moved to Seattle and I had to get up at 5:00 o'clock in the morning to catch the ferry back to Bremerton every morning because I was Boys Club president.

The climate in the '50s and '60s for black performers or black people in the entertainment business was atrocious. It was atrocious.

You want your parents to say, "Hey, I'm proud of you." When you don't hear that, you learn to compensate. You say, "Hell, I don't need their approval. If I get my music right, I'll have everyone else's approval." I didn't understand it then, but I now know that's what happened to me.

Young people should travel, and they don’t. You can’t know if you don’t go.

A person's age can be determined by the degree of pain he experiences when he comes in contact with a new idea.

My earliest memories are being pinned to a fence with a switchblade.