I was kind of known as a ballad singer. People would send ballads. Some of them would go over my shoulder and float off the top of my head, and I just didn't feel anything. Then I would hear a song that would absolutely shake me.

I recorded my first jazz record in the '70s.

I wanted to make a jazz record. I didn't want it to be a standards record.

I don't think I was considered to be a cabaret singer because I didn't have patter that was written.

It seems that jazz is more cerebral and more mathematical in a sense.

I've got my whole life. There's a lifetime of experience, a lifetime of experiencing the road and the music and different players. It makes me a richer human being. I have a greater source of information to tap into, a wealth of life.

Possibly, I should have been a jazz singer from the beginning.