I chose the trombone because the trombone players in the marching band got to be up front with the majorettes (because of the slides) and I loved that!

Eight kids and a stepmother, and I just wanted to be out of there and so when I got a scholarship from Boston to the Schillinger House, which is now the Berklee School of Music, I couldn't wait to get out of there.

When I was about five or seven years old my mother was placed in a mental institution and so we were with our father who worked very hard, and we had to figure a lot of things out.

Im probably the only one in the world you can name thats worked with Billie Holiday, Louie Armstrong, Ella, Duke, Miles, Dizzy, Ray Charles, Aretha, Michael Jackson, rappers. Fly Me to the Moon was played on the moon by Buzz Aldrin. Sinatra. Paul Simon. Tony Bennett. Im the only one.

I started imagining this whole different world. It was a society of musicians, a family I hoped I could belong to one day.

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.

Every day you must be able to say, I have to get up because I'm needed by someone. As long as you have that, you're healthy.