I am viewed as the Negro who has gone outside of the categories assigned to me.

Is jazz a rhythm, or is it a vibration?

Everybody in America is angry about something.

I am interested in the study of music and the discipline of music and the experience of music and music as a esoteric mechanism to continue my real intentions.

I have learned through time that not everyone is interested in the kinds of things that fascinate me.

The word music is a convenient way to talk about what I'm interested in, but actually, in some ways, it's a limitation.

I would find myself backing away from all of the 'isms,' all of the communities. I have always been able to be misused by every community But that is OK. I would rather be misused than neglected.

I thank the Creator of the universe to have discovered the discipline of music was the greatest gift that I could have been given, the possibility to be a student working in the world.

My work has been marginalized as far as the jazz-business complex is concerned, or the contemporary-music complex.

I know I’m an African-American, and I know I play the saxophone, but I’m not a jazz musician. I’m not a classical musician, either. My music is like my life: It’s in between these areas.

So, yes, I am in the underground, but actually, it feels like home.

And even a liar can be scared into telling the truth, same as honest man can be tortured into telling a lie.

I just find it interesting that kids apparently used to cry when Bambi's mother died. George and I both held our breaths, and then cheered when she didn't reanimate and try to eat her son.

As I remember my grandfather and those Christmas mornings he gave for a little girl's pleasure, I know that often a big life starts with doing small things.

Young people don't really study the facts; they watch the skewed MSNBC and get a primarily liberal education.

I am as drunk as a lord, but then, I am one, so what does it matter ?

Often you just have to rely on your intuition.

Anything that happens that's good, they think, Oh, it's an accident, when is the roof caving in? You've got to get them out of that mental framework.

That is why I have called feminism nihilism. It says that being a woman is nothing definite and that the duty of women is to advance that nothingness as a cause.

It would be wonderful if people could grow together in groups, teaching and learning communities where they empower, evoke, explore the enormous capacities of the human condition.

Intelligent people make many mistakes because they cannot believe the world is really as foolish as it is.