Because I'm associated with an avant-garde sensibility, people think I'm looking down on popular culture, but I don't want to be part of a new elitism.

If you've never felt that you quite got a hold of it, you just feel that before you die, you've got to try and get it right once. And hope that the experience you have makes up for the some of the diminishing energy.

When I lost the use of my hi-hat and bass drum legs, I became basically a singer. I was a drummer who did a bit of singing, and then I became a singer who did a bit of percussion.

I just saw a recent television program about art, and it was saying how from the end of the Second World War, so much of what our culture is comes from not just the United States in general, but New York in particular. In my case, I can't imagine my life without the extraordinary bebop jazz revolution in New York in late '40s and '50s.

I consider myself a sit-down comedian really, as much as anything else. I love comedy. Life is a cosmic joke.

The most effective instruments do have a vocal quality.

I only choose musicians who I think will emerge, can emerge, with their own character, while still going along with the tune in question.