An improviser does not operate from a formless vacuum, but from three billion years of organic evolution

The most potent muse of all is our own inner child.

The conception, composition, practice, and performance of a piece of music can blossom in a single moment.

There are only people doing their imperfect best at doing their imperfect jobs

Writing, playing, composing, painting, reading, listening, looking-all require that we submit to being swept away by Eros, to a transformation of self of the kind that happens when we fall in love.

Play is the taproot from which original art springs. It is the raw stuff that the artist channels with all his learning and technique.

Brahms once remarked that the mark of an artist is how much he throws away. Nature, the great creator, is always throwing things away. A frog lays several million eggs at a sitting. Only a few dozen of these become tadpoles, and only a few of those become frogs. We can let imagination and practice be as profligate as nature.