If you can play the blues, you can do anything.

I heard someone say that all black people got rhythm. Bullshit.

[On his heroin addiction:] I did it to myself. It wasn't society...it wasn't a pusher, it wasn't being blind or being black or being poor. It was all my doing.

All my life I've always been so blue, born to lose, and now I'm losing you.

I was born with music inside me. Music was one of my parts. Like my ribs, my kidneys, my liver, my heart. Like my blood. It was a force already within me when I arrived on the scene. It was a necessity for me-like food or water.

I'm not a jazz singer, blues singer or country singer. I'm a singer that can sing rhythm & blues, that can sing jazz, that can sing country. There's a big difference. In other words, I'm not a specialist.

I cant retire from music any more than I can retire from my liver. Youd have to remove the music from me surgically—like you were taking out my appendix.