“Drummers – sometimes they play and they listen. And that little listen takes a speck away from the right tempo.”

I always listen to what I can leave out.

Some day I’m gonna call me up on the phone, so when I answer, I can tell myself to shut up.

Jazz is an Uncle Tom word. They should stop using that word for selling. I told George Wein the other day that he should stop using it.

In improvisation, there are no mistakes.

If I hear a song like “Time After Time.” I’m sittin’ there lookin’ at video and Cindy Lauper comes on singin’ this song. I said, “God damnnnnn!”

Certain drummers drop time, and I like to play on top of the beat.

[Jazz musicians] feel comfortable with their clichés, you know.

It takes you years to learn how to play like yourself.

It’s not about standing still and becoming safe. If anybody wants to keep creating they have to be about change.

A painting is music you can see and music is a painting you can hear.

You can’t eat a winner’s plaque.

Bebop didn’t have the humanity of Duke Ellington. It didn’t even have that recognizable thing. Bird and Diz were great, fantastic, challenging – but they weren’t sweet.

If you understood everything I say, you’d be me!

What’s swinging in words? If a guy makes you pat your foot and if you feel it down your back, you don’t have to ask anybody if that’s good music or not. You can always feel it.

I think every Negro over fifty should get a medal for putting up with all that crap.

With “We Are The World,” I can’t even eat when I watch that on television. If I’m eatin’ some food, I have to put it down. I feel very strongly about that.

A dancer must listen to his body and pay homage to it. Behind the movement lies this terrible, driving passion, this necessity. I won’t settle for anything less.

I encourage everyone to know that God has a plan for their life and that God never makes a mistake even though it seems like He is not listening or paying attention sometimes.

God gave you just one mouth but He gave you two ears, so you should listen twice as much as you speak

No one can listen to your body for you. To grow and heal, you have to take responsibility for listening to it yourself.

Listen. Her silence tells a story.

I still listen to older music a lot more than new singers. I listen to whatever’s on the radio, but when I want to listen to something that moves me I put on a Stevie Wonder record.

If there’s one thing I’ve learned about women, which I try to pass on to my boys, it’s listening. Listen to the other side of the story first.

Knowledge talks, wisdom listens.