I don't believe that jazz will ever really die. It's a nice way to express yourself.

I'm definitely a romantic, I don't think life is really worth all the pain and effort and struggling if you don't have somebody that you love very much

You don't know what love is, until you've learned the meaning of the blues, until you've loved a love you've had to lose.

It seems to me that most people are impressed with just three things: how fast you can play, how high you can play, and how loud you can play.

Your looks are laughable, unphotographable, yet you're my favorite work of art. Is your figure less than Greek, is your mouth a little weak? When you open it to speak, are you smart?

I soon became aware that there wasn't enough time or opportunity to kiss all the girls in the world. The best thing is to stay cool - just be choosy and wait for the right opportunity.

In Europe they look upon jazz as art. In America it's a diversion. Somebody opens a restaurant and installs another band off to the side. People don't listen.

Well if I could play like Wynton, I wouldn't play like Wynton.

It takes a pretty good drummer to be better than no drummer at all.

The drummer; he inspired me to play like no one else I have ever met.

Artt Frank is my all-time favorite drummer. He always seems to know where I'm going.

shrimp and green peppers are shriveling in my refrigerator

Treat your friends as you do your pictures, and place them in their best light.

Captain and coach must be seen to be banging the same drum.

jokes are used to hide the truth!

I'd also remind people, if I were running for Presidency, that a long-term problem facing the budget is Social Security and Medicare.

None of the editors I've worked with have ever asked me to pull my punches. They've never asked me to give them anything other than my own interpretation of events.

Write from the soul, not from some notion what you think the marketplace wants. The market is fickle; the soul is eternal.

Greatness is the aggregation of minuteness; nor can its sublimity be felt truthfully by any mind unaccustomed to the affectionate watching of what is least.

Most of those who make collections of verse or epigram are like men eating cherries or oysters: they choose out the best at first, and end by eating all.

I think a lot of people think because I was getting the divorce, that was really the catalyst for gaining so much weight.