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

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

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

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

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.

I felt bad for the girls in my school, who flocked to prom like it was the second coming of Christ, complete with double-rainbows and unicorns.

Don't stop at the first no. You have to be a risk taker. If there weren't room for creativity, the patent office would close down.

I am a member of that small, little group that covers - I'm a member of the White House correspondents association. I go to the White House every day.

Politics is a romantic search for the good and the true and the beautiful.

Eloquence is to the sublime what the whole is to the part.

Evolution is the most popular way we have for dealing with change.

I think we females have a lot of work to do for each other.

The same set of statistics can produce opposite conclusions at different levels of aggregation.

Perseverance is an active principle, and cannot continue to operate but under the influence of desire.