I love Indian music very much, but I haven't studied that specifically.

In some ways Lester Young is the most complex rhythmically of any musician. He does some things which are just phenomenal.

I understood that if I wanted to work, the saxophone was the main instrument. The clarinet was what we call a double.

Benny Goodman was one of the big influences as a clarinet player. That's why I wanted the clarinet.

I could stop and say, Well that was a D minor, G seven, but I really don't want to know that. I just want to know that there's a combination of notes that makes a sound.

Most jazz players work out their solos, at least to the extent that they have a very specific vocabulary.

As long as there are people trying to play music in a sincere way, there will be Jazz.

After playing now for 60 years, it's still very challenging for me to play a simple melody and have it clean and touch the reed at the proper time in the proper way.

A first love always occupies a special place.

I'd like to feel that whatever I play is a result of whatever I've heard.

I have been able to get a small audience. It's not the huge audience, but it's enough to make it possible to play. I appreciate that.

We lose ourselves in things we love. We find ourselves there, too.

I still like some of the stuff, skateboarding. Just stupid things.

Your memories become fantasies if they are not shared, and your life in all its triviality becomes a legend.

Pleasure that isn't paid for is as insipid as everything else that's free.

Wherever human life is concerned, the unnatural stricture of excessive verticality cannot stand against more natural horizontality.

Peace is not merely an absence of war. It is also a state of mind.

One thing and one thing alone keeps us from complete decay in this hour - the church, the true Church.

If I had a dollar for every time I smiled secretly having you in my mind I think my bank account would show up millions.

If you want to be famous, you have to do whatever youre doing worse than anyone else in the whole world.

Most people spend their lives building financial houses of straws, which are susceptible to wind, fire, rain and big bad wolves.