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" Desegregation is a joke. "

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" To me, we are the most beautiful creatures in the whole world. Black people. And I mean that in every sense. "

" I think that the artists who don't get involved in preaching messages probably are happier - but you see, I have to live with Nina, and that is very difficult. "

" From the beginning, it has been a no-no for a black man to touch a white woman. "

" You feel the shame, humiliation, and anger at being just another victim of prejudice, and at the same time, there's the nagging worry that maybe... you're just no good. "

" I wasn't a jazz player, but a classical musician, and I improvised arrangements of popular songs using classical motifs. "

" Did you know that the human voice is the only pure instrument? That it has notes no other instrument has? It's like being between the keys of a piano. The notes are there, you can sing them, but they can't be found on any instrument. That's like me. I live in between this. I live in both worlds, the black and white world. "

" I would like a man now who is rich, and who can give me a boat - a sailboat. I want to own it and let him pay for it. My first love is the sea and water, not music. Music is second. "

" Sometimes I sound like gravel, and sometimes I sound like coffee and cream. "

" When I was studying... there weren't any black concert pianists. My choices were intuitive, and I had the technique to do it. People have heard my music and heard the classic in it, so I have become known as a black classical pianist. "

" My daughter is in more competition with me. I never wanted to be bigger than my mother or to challenge her. "

" I'm not a blues singer, I'm a diva. "

" As a political weapon, it has helped me for 30 years defend the rights of American blacks and third-world people all over the world, to defend them with protest songs. To move the audience to make them conscious of what has been done to my people around the world. "

" I'll tell you what freedom is to me: no fear. I mean really, no fear! "

" There's no excuse for the young people not knowing who the heroes and heroines are or were. "

" Once I understood Bach's music, I wanted to be a concert pianist. Bach made me dedicate my life to music, and it was that teacher who introduced me to his world. "

" I don't like rap music at all. I don't think it's music. It's just a beat and rapping. "

" I had spent many years pursuing excellence, because that is what classical music is all about... Now it was dedicated to freedom, and that was far more important. "

" At this crucial time in our lives, when everything is so desperate, when every day is a matter of survival, I don't think you can help but be involved. "

" It's an artist's duty to reflect the times in which we live. "

" I flirt all the time. I like men! I don't think we can do without them. "

" To most white people, jazz means black and jazz means dirt, and that's not what I play. I play black classical music. "

" I'm a real rebel with a cause. "

" When I'm on that stage, I assume honor. I assume compensation, and I should. "

" I want to shake people up so bad, that when they leave a nightclub where I've performed, I just want them to be to pieces. "

" Jazz is a white term to define black people. My music is black classical music. "

" This may be a dream, but I'll say it anyway: I was supposed to be married last year, and I bought a gown. When I meet Nelson Mandela, I shall put on this gown and have the train of it removed and put aside, and kiss the ground that he walks on and then kiss his feet. "

" I think the rich will eventually have to cave in too, because the economic situation around the world is not gonna tolerate the United States being on top forever. "

" I think if I were over there in America, protest music would be more important. But I'm not going. "

" What I was interested in was conveying an emotional message, which means using everything you've got inside you sometimes to barely make a note, or if you have to strain to sing, you sing. "

" All the time, there was the weight of my community's expectations on my shoulders. "