“There’s no comparison between the two. You hear things in New York you don’t hear anywhere else. Unless these guys go out. Quite a few make it out to the Coast. Of course, you can’t stay in New York for ever. You have to move.”

I used to live at the Cecil Hotel, which was next door to Minton’s [Playhouse]. We used to jam just about every night when we were off. Lester [Young], Don Byas and myself – we would meet there all the time and like, exchange ideas. It wasn’t a battle, or anything.

I’ve been back in New York a year and a half now. Before that I was on the West Coast for five years.

If you try all different styles that are in vogue, I think you con yourself. Me, I just stick by my guns; I don’t want to play out of another man’s bag.

I like to play things that people understand, or maybe tunes that they could recognize. And so — I play for the people, just as much as for myself. Because, as I say, I still like to play.

I dont listen to my own records a lot. Once in a while – to check out my mistakes. Because you can always see a spot or two in the record where you could have done better. So you more or less study this way.

I don’t want to play out of another man’s bag.

Like every other place, I guess, Kansas City was quite a different city when I was a youngster there. They had quite a few clubs, and we had what we used to call jam sessions every night.

It’s hard for me not to play on the West Coast. I love it out there.

Many years ago, in the late ’70s, I toured colleges along the East Coast and I presented a kind of show where I got a lot of books and poetry and pieces of [William] Shakespeare and other writers that I admire.

Now I’m in Indianapolis, and my new offensive coordinator is implementing a West Coast offense that should get me plenty of carries and a few catches each game.

We gotta understand that Hip Hop is now universal. Hip Hop is not East coast or West coast.

It’s always funny to me when people meet me. They really think I’m from the East coast off top. When they get to talkin’ to me, they go “Oh no, she’s sooooo Southern”

The fact that my students could be in a little college in a little college town on the coast of Rhode Island

We can still maintain our coasts and oceans for the generations to come, who deserve what we have.

I love to sail forbidden seas, and land on barbarous coasts.