In composition you have all the time you want to decide what to say in 15 seconds, in improvisation you have 15 seconds.

The soprano has all those other instruments in it. It's got the soprano song voice, flute, violin, clarinet, and tenor elements and can even approach the baritone in intensity.

Jazz is people's music, a collectivity.

There is an awful lot of what I call recreational jazz going on, where people go out and learn a particular language or style and become real sharks on somebody else's language.

Whoever has an original thing to say, it is sort of a threat to the status quo.

The potential for the saxophone is unlimited.

Saxophone is one thing, and music is another.

You can work on the saxophone alone, but ultimately you must perform with others.

I still love the whole history of jazz. The old things sound better than ever.

It starts with a single sound. If there's something in that sound, then it's worth continuing.

I think it is in collaboration that the nature of art is revealed.

If you do not tell me, I don’t wish to know.

Faith precedes all great accomplishments.

If you'll laugh about something one day, you may as well start now.

I think I have a pretty good take on popular culture that maybe makes up for the fact that I'm not a sound-bite politician for the nightly news.

Isn't it true that every aristocrat wants to die?

No man is born without faults.

I don't believe in children's books. I think after you've read Kidnapped, Treasure Island, and Huckleberry Finn, you're ready for anything.

Some are born to invent, others to embellish; but the gilder attracts more attention than the architect.

I guess I make things that need energy stronger. I'm like a walking battery.

No man has come so near our definition of a constitutional statesman - the powers of a first-rate man and the creed of a second-rate man.