“Remembering that life can be full of surprises is useful in any part of your life.”

I found that if I sang a line using the consonants, vowels, shadings, and inflection we recognize as human language sounds, people responded as if I were talking to them.

You can try a new way of singing a song you’ve performed for years, a new way of showing your family your love for them, or a new recipe.

I want them to have this sense of real, real joy from the depths of their being. Because I think when you take them to that place, then you open up a place where grace can come in.

Improvisation is the courage to move from one note to the next.

And you realise you’re doing a public service in making people happy – as a musician you can give people something a doctor, a lawyer, a politician cannot give them that. It’s not scientific.

It’s not that I don’t love the song. My songs are like my children: some you want around and some you want to send off to college as soon as possible.

Whenever I’m onstage, I try my best not to think that I’m performing. It’s simply another part of my day.

My father was a very disciplined singer who worked hard at his craft, and I was around that growing up.

When we listen to improvisational jazz, or solo classical violinists, the way they phrase and inflect melodies feels vocal, like they’re talking to us.

Each of us might give that phrase a different meaning. It’s open to interpretation, and one song becomes a thousand songs. I love that.

I actually fought the idea for a while because it seemed almost too radical, but it became obvious what I was supposed to be doing.

Here’s a little song I wrote. You might want to sing it note for note. Don’t worry, be happy.

The true musician is to bring light into people’s hearts.

The voice gets to the soul of a person more than any other instrument. Because it’s the voice. It sings talks, it cries, it laughs, it squeals, it barks, it shouts it whispers, There is no other instrument that can do that. We’re born with it.

The achievements of Labour in the years after the Second World War should never be underestimated, but they are now history.

I have a 41-year track record of investing excellence… what do you have?

It was 22 years of work in a row, right up until 1987. Twenty-two years in a row-either on tour, writing an album, or recording an album. It wasn’t until 1987 that I was able to take a breath.

The truth is, anybody that becomes famous is an ass for a year and a half. You’ve got to give them a year and a half, two years.

I was just 17 years old and had to get some new friends to actually sign up for me to get electricity and utilities because I wasn’t even old enough to have things like that.

The most outrageous thing happened years ago in my YouTube days, when I asked an older lady – it was like a sexually flavored question and she just slapped me full-on across the face. That’s the one time someone got physically aggressive with me. And it hurt.

Well when I was a kid, I asked Santa Claus for some toys. Santa Claus wrote me a letter that he lost his bag. He said he’d get back to me next year.

I’ve been doing Porky Pig for 21 years for Warner Brothers.