“It’s one of the characteristics of a leader that he not doubt for one moment the capacity of the people he’s leading to realize whatever he’s dreaming. Imagine if Martin Luther King had said, ‘I have a dream. Of course, I’m not sure they’ll be up to it.”

Imagine Martin Luther King saying, ‘I have a dream … But I don’t know if the others will buy it.’

The major difference between the ‘best’ and the ‘average’ is that the ‘best’ get as much pleasure from practice as performance.

It’s not a question of how much power you can hoard for yourself, but how much you can give away.

When you make a mistake, throw your hands in the air and say “How fascinating!”

My job [is] to awaken possibility in other people. If their eyes are shining, you know you’re doing it. If they’re not shining you get to ask this question: “Who am I being that my children’s eyes are not shining?”

Throw yourself into life as someone who makes a difference, accepting that you may not understand how or why.

It is the tuning of the universe… It’s as if at the beginning of the symphony God turns up the volume just a tiny bit.

I have a definition of success.

If you make a mistake, celebrate.

The conductor of an orchestra doesn’t make a sound. He depends, for his power, on his ability to make other people powerful.

This is the moment — this is the most important moment right now. Which is: We are about contribution. That’s what our job is. It’s not about impressing people. It’s not about getting the next job. It’s about contributing something.

Who am I being that my players’ eyes are not shining?

The job of the leader is to speak to the possibility.

I make myself a relentless architect of the possibilities of human beings.

We can replace the narratives that hold us back by inventing wiser stories, free from childish fears, and, in doing so, disperse long-held psychological stumbling blocks.

how absurd human beings are and how magnificent.

A gambit never becomes sheer routine as long as you fear you may lose the king and pawn ending!

Who built the seven gates of Thebes? In the books are listed the names of kings. Did the kings heave up the building blocks?

Of course, the kids who had never heard of a person called Ben E. King were then aware of the name associated with the song. That gave a tremendous lift to me as an artist.

I always seem to be cast as slightly wan, ethereal, troubled intellectuals or physically ambivalent bad lovers. But I’m here to tell you I’m quite the opposite in real life. In fact I’m a f**king fantastic lover.

A good king is a public servant.

Breath is the king of mind.

Martin Luther King, with whom I worked very closely, became very distressed when a number of the ministers working for him wanted him to dismiss me from his staff because of my homosexuality.

I could probably live in Bali the rest of my life and completely live in the sticks and have a f – king moped and make a record every couple of years and not step in public and break even like I do anyway. That’s really tempting.