“It’s a spirit that was given me and the relationships and meeting all these great people, Duke Ellington, Louis Armstrong; through Max I met a lot of people too. My first album was with Benny Carter.”

There are men and women still on the streets, and that’s all they are saying Can you spare a quarter? I come from a crowd of people who were current on the outlook on life, who were social and knew where they were and had some input into how things seemed to be.

Sing a song correctly and you live forever.

You can never loose a thing If it belongs to you.

I am the first instrument. I am the voice. I do not imitate other instruments. Other instruments imitate me.

The best thing you can do is to be a woman and stand before the world and speak your heart.

I think that’s what really a substantial work is, it’s forever. It’s the truth now and it was the truth then, and it will be the truth tomorrow.

I don’t have to lay on the couch and see a therapist because my therapist is in my paint brushes.

If they can afford what I ask, it’s not as much as Madonna makes; not that I want what Madonna makes, but I was saying.

But I’ve been there and done that. I’m not trying to prove anything to anybody, and if somebody wants me to come.

We have inherited a great music. This music is a holdover. It comes with us like the skin, the texture of our hair. It’s our memory banks.

I was looking for the people who were making the music inside the cabinet. I would look in there and see if I could find somebody who was making all this wonderful music.

The great music for so many artists – the Beatles, the Rolling Stones – was always at the moment when they were closest to pop. It would be easy for U2 to go off and have a concept album, but I want us to stay in the pop fray.

When I want to check out how my lifes been, I go through my albums. They steps in my life.

From day one when you’re singing, you’re dreaming about making that first album and making your break into whatever music you want to break into.

Every time I release an album my old record company releases another one.

I picked and co-wrote the songs that if I was a guy who would be spending my hard-earned money buying an album I would want to hear.

You’re always frustrated, you don’t have the chance to do a song on the album, like the Beatles did with Ringo and George, or like Led Zeppelin, where everybody was given a chance to contribute. There never is a chance with the Stones.

I tried acting and all of the arts, I even put out a record album, but what I like the most is business.

I’m narrating the television series Biography. I’m still involved in my music – I have a new album out. I have an animated project in development. I’m writing a lot of things and you never know if one of them is going to become a six or seven year project.