The loudest noise in the world is silence.

Whatever you think can’t be done, somebody will come along and do it. A genius is the one most like himself.

I say, play your own way. Don't play what the public want - you play what you want and let the public pick up on what you doing - even if it does take them fifteen, twenty years.

Sometimes it's to your advantage for people to think you're crazy

There are no wrong notes; some are just more right than others.

Trying to explain music is like trying to dance architecture.

Jazz is freedom. You think about that.

Don't play everything (or every time); let some things go by... What you don't play can be more important than what you do.

Jazz is my adventure. I'm after new chords, new ways of syncopating, new figures, new runs. How to use notes differently. That's it. Just using notes differently.

The only cats worth anything are the cats that take chances.

All musicians are subconsciously mathematicians.

We all have some worth but we do not have the same net worth.

Life is a bliss only if you carefully understand it.

Victory over fear is one of the conditions of fulfilling the vision

In the interests of economy they condemned hundreds of children to death and I call it murder.

And then we take a soldier and put murder in his hands and we say to him, "Use it well, use it wisely.

I did all sorts of jobs after drama school - working in a bar, as a teaching assistant. I probably learned as much from them as I did at drama school.

No other person ever has, or ever will have, the unique blend of talents, strengths, and perspective that you have.

The marriage of convenience has this to recommend it: we are better judges of convenience than we are of love.

I'm glad a genre writer has got a knighthood, but stunned that it was me.

With one exception everybody who has ever been involved with me is still a great friend of mine.