I'm not a reactionary.

When a human being without amplification makes a sound that is high and loud, it is almost unworldly.

Certainly, jazz has become more of a niche, which is surprising, because it's our music. It's the national music of America.

We are unique, each human voice, not because we are completely self-generated, but because of who we choose to assemble the countless factors that made us.

We sing with the entire body. The sounds that we make emanate not just from the head, but from the whole heart and soul, and, most important, the gut.

I don't want to be somebody who stands still and sings pretty. Each song is a world. Each song is a story. I don't achieve nearly what I want.

Everybody's a work in progress. I'm a work in progress. I mean, I've never arrived. I'm still learning all the time.

There's no performance where I never have to think about setting up a phrase or making a technical adjustment while I'm performing.

Someone once said that there are probably seven naturally good singing days in a year-and those are days you won't be booked. What we must learn is how to sing through all the other days.

It is our responsibility to learn how to speak to an audience that is less informed about music, to give it a reason to want to come and see us instead of going to the movies.

I don't want to record anything unless it can be great and genuinely interesting.

I have no taste for either poverty or honest labor, so writing is the only recourse left for me.

From the point in life when a man/woman is responsible for his/her choices, he/she starts to live a story brought to life by the dreams that have been consciously or subconsciously conceived.

It's not just about ideasit's about making ideas happenDO IT!

It won't take long before I explode with pent-up rage.

An actor entering through the door, you've got nothing. But if he enters through the window, you've got a situation.

The goal of evolution is self - conquest

I became a feminist because I wanted to help my daughters, other women and myself aspire to something more than a place behind a good man.

I'm no one's lap dog, you can't put me on a leash.

Next to an old-fashioned church social, or possibly a monster bridge party, there is no buzz which can equal the sibilant buzz ofa matinée.

I think it's important to do a good job and not to feel that you've got to make grand gestures, but just to get on and deliver.