But anything that you hear about Japan is nothing like what you see when you actually go over there and see it, you know, in a real situation.

Because the stuff that they feed kids now, they'll have a bunch of idiots in the next millennium as far as art and culture is concerned.

The Japanese actually approach the music on a high level. It's always been on a high level.

You know the drum was the first instrument besides the human voice.

If I couldn't do it, then I'd be defeated. I've got the tools to do it. I never did question my tools.

If somebody would come and they're not playing music, they would encounter certain people on another level.

Jazz needs the help. It's the more sophisticated music. All the other music is on the TV, but jazz isn't.

The French - they like jazz, theyve been on jazz a long time.

Theres so much beautiful music in the world, and the kids are getting robbed.

It's something that - jazz is one of the few things that you can go and listen to, I don't care where you're from, what you are, what background you come from - there's something there for you.

I might have played a little bit more in Europe than I have in Japan.

Just my luck, if I believed in luck. I only believe in the opposite of luck, whatever that is.

. . . crazy world or maybe it's just the view we have of it, looking through a crack in the door, never being able to see the whole room, the whole picture.

I have seen flowers come in stony placesAnd kind things done by men with ugly faces, And the gold cup won by the worst horse at the races, So I trust, too.

I'd like to apologise to the British people for the state our politics is in.

I am no bird; and no net ensnares me; I am a free human being with an independent will.

Talk with your doctor, make healthy lifestyle choices and most importantly, know your body - as that can make all the difference in the world.

The most important criteria for a DNC chair is going to be vision.

The stars were my best friends. The air was full of legends and phantoms, full of mythical and fair-tale creatures, which suddenly flew away over the roof, so that one was at one with the firmament.

If your intelligence and your luck are on your side, you don't need angels!

At least one day out of the year all musicans should just put their instruments down, and give thanks to Duke Ellington.