Being black, I'm involved in the reparations movement. It's focused toward the African-American audience. We could begin to heal.

I cringed when I heard myself described as a Jazz singer. I've always thought of myself as a Jazz vocalist.

Miles Davis was doing something inherently African, something that has to do with all forms of American music, not just jazz.

I was never interested in singing in the church or school. I was more interested in becoming a musician.

My grandmother sang, too, and she was really loud. It was this wild kind of singing. I count her among my influences.

My father had all kinds of instruments in the house that he would hide from my mother. He bought them through mail order!

Miles Davis was a master. In every phase of his career, he understood that this music was a tribute to the African muse.

I'm always imagining some sort of story behind the song, even the ones I haven't written. I'm actively engaging in playacting.

Everything I do is collaborative. It's just my way. I'm really very interested in how the other musicians perceive the song.

I'm always looking for ways to develop as a Jazz artist, to find different ways of using my voice.

Here, in this quiet place we own, worlds are born.

When you want to encourage a greater sense of responsibility in others (and yourself), emphasize the anticipation of accomplishment, not the penalties for failure.

When I get tired of new clunky writing, I resort to old fashioned story tellers, like Wilkie Collins.

I fix things now and then, more often tweak HTML and make scripts to do things.

You can't be funny unless you're tragic, and you can't be tragic unless you're funny.

It's really nice when life comes full circle and you get to work with people four years down the line.

Arnold Bennett was a writer I admired. He was actually taking notes at his father's deathbed.

I am never as clear about any matter as when I have finished writing about it.

He who cannot see the beautiful side is a bad painter, a bad friend, a bad lover; he cannot lift his mind and his heart so high as goodness.

In the '90s, there was a big bell-bottom craze. Everyone was wearing grungy bell-bottoms. It was so repugnant to me.

I get scared to death when I see people who say they've found Jesus Christ, and they're out there, and I wonder, who's teaching them? Who's mentoring them?