I am glad that I wrote something that brought joy to millions of people.

My brother had a big band in high school; after that we continued to play together, eventually forming a group called the Jazz Brothers, that recorded for Riverside Records.

Music is meant to be a beautiful thing.

I write music people enjoy playing and listening to, and I have a group that loves playing the music.

I tend to not want to put labels or categories on the music, only because people come with preconceived ideas about what they're going to hear, or won't come for this reason.

I was blessed to work with The Jazz Messengers when the two piano players were Keith Jarrett and Chick Corea.

A studio recording is perfection, but emotion and passion come only when you turn on the machine and go for the groove. If you do that with no mistakes, it sounds beautiful.

Whether it's string writing or whatever, I try to write for what each instrumentalist can do best.

1972 was a year of many pleasant and rewarding experiences for me

Brazilian music has many of the ingredients that I strive for in my own music: Strong melodies and a disciplined but intense rhythmic concept, and interesting harmonies.

In 1994, I started touring again and I recorded two albums for Chesky Jazz.

How can you put human rights to a popular vote and call it democracy? How many times do you need to redefine or haggle about the meaning of the word EQUALITY?

We never stop to consider that our beliefs are only a relative truth that's always going to be distorted by all the knowledge we have stored in our memory.

I think the extreme complexity of medicine has become more than an individual clinician can handle. But not more than teams of clinicians can handle.

Painting, like passion, is a living voice, which, when I hear it, I must let it speak, unfettered.

The funny thing is, about the time I let go of any aspiration toward worldly success, that's about the time I started writing decent work.

[Arnold Schwarzenegger] is funny. Some great one-liners, some great banter between him and the contestants [on "The Apprentice" ]. And he's good!

I can’t wait to get into a position to make really bad art and get away with it.

My theories explain, but cannot slow the decline of a great civilization. I set out to be a reformer, but only became the historian of decline.

Part of the challenge of innovation is coming up with the problem to solve, not just its solution.

To live and to laugh require a reason. But dancing is so close to one's guts that it has no reason and yet it needs none; it's physical, and as a source of good cheer it is end endless.