I just think swing is a matter of some good things put together that you can really pat your foot by. I can't define it beyond that.

Of course, there are a lot of ways you can treat the blues, but it will still be the blues.

Learn to deal with the valleys and the hills will take care of themselves.

It's the way you play that makes it . . . Play like you play. Play like you think, and then you got it, if you're going to get it. And whatever you get, that's you, so that's your story.

If you play a tune and a person don't tap their feet, don't play the tune.

The real innovators did their innovating by just being themselves.

If you find a note tonight that sounds good, play the same damn note every night!

I was always willing to say, "Let's see what happens," when something came up that looked like it might help me get a little closer to where I wanted to be . . .

Keep on listening & tapping your feet.

I think the band can really swing when it swings easy, when it can just play along like you are cutting butter.

All I wanted was to be big, to be in show business and to travel ... and that's what I've been doing all my life.

What is a woman that you forsake herAnd the hearth fire and the home acreTo go with that old grey widow-maker?

It wasn't only fanatics and drunkards who began conversations with strangers in public.

Generally speaking, you like to dance with the girl that brung you, and if you can't sometimes you have to shoot her.

All the Hollywood bullshit and accolades and money really doesn't matter. It just gives you a slightly nicer house and slightly nicer food and slightly shinier hair.

Insecurity is the worst sense that lovers feel; sometimes the most humdrum desireless marriage seems better. Insecurity twists meanings and poisons trust.

Being on a sitcom stops me from getting Alzheimer's.

I'm such a fan of anime and manga to this day, but I never really like got to know all the characters and everything, so I don't think I'd be able to pick one.

We drank our coffee the Russian way. That is to say we had vodka before it and vodka afterwards.

Her lips were red, her looks were free, Her locks were yellow as gold: Her skin was white as leprosy, The Nightmare Life-in-Death was she, Who thicks man's blood with cold.

I think that it's hard for vain people to be funny. I think you can look any way you want as long as you have a good sense of humor about yourself.