I appreciate men like Ben Webster and Coleman Hawkins very much.

I had a 10-year heroin habit and kicked that. Then I became an alcoholic. I drank two fifth's a day.

I appreciate men like Ben Webster and Coleman Hawkins very much.

My life is music, and in some vague, mysterious and subconscious way, I have always been driven by a taut inner spring which has propelled me to almost compulsively reach for perfection in music, often - in fact, mostly - at the expense of everything else in my life.

Life is too full of distractions nowadays. When I was a kid we had a little Emerson radio and that was it. We were more dedicated. We didn't have a choice.

We recorded to document ourselves, not to sell a lot of records.

The saxophone is an imperfect instrument, especially the tenor and soprano, as far as intonation goes. The challenge is to sing on an imperfect instrument that is outside of your body.