I learned from Van Morrison and BB King that the first take is the best. It's about capturing a moment. It's the same as love's first kiss. If you try to do it again, it doesn't work so well.

Without the piano my life would be a disaster - nobody would hold me in any regard. It's the thing that saved me.

As a bandleader, I try to pass on the same family values that I grew up with: help people, hang on to your sense of humour, be tolerant and keep your judgments to yourself.

It would be great to have Bach in one corner, Bessie Smith in another, John Lennon in another. That's what I'd ideally like. A studio of the dead.

'The Tube' was the first time the plebs had gone on the television. The lunatics taking over the asylum.

Due to my work, I tend to stay in hotels a lot of the time, and I generally prefer smaller hotels, as you tend to get better service than in the larger hotels.

Amy Winehouse and Paul Weller are examples of poets, I think.

A good example of the modern world is the Eurotunnel. And mobile phones - I like them.

I do so much travelling in my work that my suitcase is always packed, with my passport ready. I rarely unpack, as I am constantly on the move.

Naggers always know what they are doing. They weigh up the risks, then they go on and on and on until they get what they want or until they get punched.

Habits are safer than rules

Occasionally I have come across a last patch of snow on top of a mountain in late May or June. There's something very powerful about finding snow in summer.

If I'm not touring I'd just be at home, just driving - I'm kind of at a loss for how that stuff works.

With dogs, you don't need gurus. Dogs are forever in the moment. They are always a tidal wave of feelings, and every feeling is some variant of love.

Here we spent so much time together - eight months of our lives almost - and it was so great because we all got so close and that really made us not afraid to improve with each other.

"Write that down," the King said to the jury, and the jury eagerly wrote down all three dates on their slates, and then added them up, and reduced the answer to shillings and pence.

You made a point about proof. In this sort of history we do nt have proof... Yet... the incontrovertibility of the evidence can be plain even when it is not documentary or complete.

The hard thing about death is that nothing ever changes. The hard thing about life is that nothing stays the same.

From the subtle to the extreme, our culture and our values are under unrelenting attack from the media.

Always inflation comes gradually; is recognized too late; and can be cured only by ruthless political surgery, which, if delayed too long, proves futile.