My first Grammy wasn't even in a jazz category, but of course I was really excited. 'Rockit' was the beginning of kind of a new era for the whole hip-hop movement.

Jazz has borrowed from other genres of music and also has lent itself to other genres of music.

The spirit of jazz is the spirit of openness.

Don't be afraid to expand yourself, to step out of your comfort zone. That's where the joy and the adventure lie.

You would not exist if you did not have something to bring to the table of life.

Music is the tool to express life - and all that makes a difference.

Forget about trying to compete with someone else. Create your own pathway. Create your own new vision.

I think there's a great beauty to having problems. That's one of the ways we learn.

You can practice to attain knowledge, but you can't practice to attain wisdom.

Music happens to be an art form that transcends language.

The most valuable things in life are priceless. They are courage, compassion, wisdom, respect for ourselves and others, and a host of characteristics that we call the beauty of the human spirit.

Love blinds me so deep and dark, I see the world full of innocence, thoughts filled with affection, time brimming with hope and future flowing with my dreams.

Promise me you'll never stop dreaming.

This is easy to say with the benefit of hindsight, but I think it once again points out how very important style of leadership, that is the way he does what he does, is to his perception.

love is the biggest con of all

If a place is in your blood, you leave it at your peril. You will never be happy anywhere else.

That's my favorite thing about him. I like to lie next to him when it's late, dark, and so quiet I can hear my own heartbeat. It's times like that when I'm sure that I'm in love.

Tolstoy was the most gifted writer who ever lived. It's like he stuck a pen in his heart and it didn't even go through his mind on its way to the page.

To the free man, the country is the collection of individuals who compose it, not something over and above them.

No, I had never intentionally caused anyone physical pain, but I had hurt Ian deeply enough just by hurting myself. Human lives were so impossibly tangled. What a mess.

We cannot build the future by avenging the past.