I didn't feel anything [frustraiting]. I just kept working 110 or 120 nights a year.

I went through the whole number, you know. The swing era, the boogie woogie era, the bebop era. Thelonious Monk is still one of my favorites. So a lot of these people had their effect on me.

All the classic jazz players all sang and a lot of 'em sang blues.

Everybody cryin' mercy / When they don't know the meaning of the word.

The things that really matter don't mix with idle chatter.

Ever since the world ended, I don't go out as much

I have no idea what I'm doin'. I've never seen me.

I been getting good crowds. It only took 50 years.

I'm playin' music for a certain type of person. Fortunately, there are more and more of us. At least there are more comin' to see me than there were 30 years ago or so.

As far as I'm concerned, the essentials of jazz are: melodic improvisation, melodic invention, swing, and instrumental personality.

I never sit down and write. I just sorta let things form in my brain.

I'm generally a happy person -with the help of antidepressants, that is- so there is something to be said for surrounding myself with happy people.

Fame means millions of people have the wrong idea of who you are.

All were artists, playing foolish, having fights and making love as if the rest of the world had no racial problems whatsoever.

I think film is a world of directors. Theater is a world of actors.

Whatever may be our condition in life, it is better to lay hold of its advantages than to count its evils.

I grew up in Cincinnati, Ohio, and my parents are really right wingers. My dad watches, like, five or six hours of Fox News every day and stuff like that.

A life of value is not a series of great things well done; it is a series of small things consciously done.

The sun teaches to all things that grow their longing for the light. But it is night that raises them to the stars.

It’s a cat. Boy, you couldn’t slip anything past me tonight.

I started out as a drummer, and now play with a back-to-basics rock band called the 'Luddites.' I'm happiest when I'm behind the kit.