And my identity...I never really wondered about it because, unfortunately, I sounded like myself. People be saying I sound like Miles or Clifford Brown.

I have friends who will critique me much harder than any review.

When did we begin to lose faith in our ability to effect change?

Ethics are more important than laws. Which means that the exact note is less important than the feeling of the note.

When I first came to New York everybody on the scene would treat me like I could play but I couldn't.

Jazz music is the power of now.

In the Jazz at Lincoln Center Orchestra we play such a diversity of music, with 10 arrangers in the band, we don't really worry about whether it's contemporary or not.