Through improvisation, jazz teaches you about yourself. And through swing, it teaches you that other people are individuals too. It teaches you how to coordinate with them.

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.

Commercialism that has absolutely no relationship to quality whatsoever, only quantitative assessment of a thing.

I didn't have a philosophical understanding of music until I came to New York. I didn't understand how it applied to my kind and my generation. I thought it was just old people talking.

There are forces all around you who wish to exploit division, rob you of your freedom, and tell you what to think. But young folks can rekindle the weary spirit of a slumbering nation.

We learn a language through its song, and even if you don't have music you have the song of people you love's voice, and you'll notice that song in their voice.

You need a team. You need people to push you. You need opponents.