Perfect retention. I dont think I could do that-Ive never disciplined myself to do it.I suppose a lot of it is a question of discipline. Which improvisation is not.

Learn the rules and then break them in such a way as to exercise good taste.

I always tell people, it took me 10 minutes and 35 years in the business. I get tired of playing it ["Lullaby of Birdland"], but not of collecting the royalties.

When people ask me how is it I was a musician, I facetiously say that I'm a firm believer in reincarnation and in a previous life I was Johann Sebastian Bach's guide dog.

My affiliation with England is borne out by the fact that I do come back for periodic visits.

The way it works: The orchestra plays a few selections of its own and I terminate the first part of the programme on piano, usually with a movement from a Mozart concerto.

If you establish an identity, you build a monster-and thats right, youve got to live with it. Of course, you can enjoy it, too.

Can anybody be given creativity? No. Only equipment to develop it if it's in them in the first place.

You know, when you've established a certain thing, what can you do? You're stuck with it.

I don't like freedom jazz - I think it's void of roots and void of foundation.

In Braille you write your flat sign first and then your note.

Decisions of character come from understanding that they are accountable to God only, not to family, spouses, religious leaders, corporations, public opinion or your own ego.

Every child is a blessing and should be raised to become a blessing to others.

In these days a man is nobody unless his biography is kept so far posted up that it may be ready for the national breakfast-table on the morning after his demise.

I'm getting more famouser by the day!

Reality is mind-made.

We are the new "barbarians", forged in iron hardness in the fires of their hate and persecution. All over the world, we wait to pounce.

Every new skill you learn, every adventure you go on, every new thing you try, it only makes you a better artist.

But remember that the Captain belongs to the most dangerous enemy to truth and freedom, the solid unmoving cattle of the majority

Thanks to the greatest invention of recent years, the MP3-playing alarm clock, I can now choose the song that wakes me up in the morning.

May not be your peace in the mouth of the men; since no matter if they thing good or bad about you, you should not be a different man because of that.