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" Journalism is my first love. But music comes in a close second. What's important for me is that whatever you do, whatever your passion is, you should have another passion - something in your life. And when I put on that musician hat and I put the bass in my hands, I'm not Lester Holt the TV guy anymore. I'm just Lester Holt who likes music. "

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" I have a couple of basses in my office. And I try to be courteous of my co-workers, but sometimes I get carried away and I crank up my amp and I rock out. It's kind of my stress reliever. "

Lester Holt

Kind

Stress

Office

" I never believed the anchorman should be the know-it-all. And I try to communicate that to the audience. While I have some knowledge from my years of experience, what I want to do is walk you through this because we're all walking through this together. "

" I'm not terribly athletic. And... there's a lot of things I'm not good at. And if it makes anybody feel better, I was really a pretty bad math student growing up. "

" I remember when I interviewed at MSNBC, one of the first things they said to me was, 'In your tapes, you had a mustache, right?' I said, 'Yeah, I recently took it off.' I said, 'If you hire me, you get to decide if you want it or not.' They said, 'No, no, we're fine with it now.' "

Lester Holt

You

Now

" I'll co-host 'TODAY' from Los Angeles Saturday morning and then make my way up to Merced for that evening's graduation ceremony. I'm still touching up my remarks, but my challenge to the Class of 2010 will be to break through the deafening and too often negative echo chamber of the digital era and become critical and independent thinkers. "

" At the end of the day, I'm reading the news. I'm not digging ditches. I'm not fighting fires. It's a long day, and it's a lot of responsibility, and it can be a little bewildering sometimes with the schedule. But, you know, it's a job, and they pay me well to do a job. "

" I have this vision of maybe going the way of Bill Kurtis and, I think, Tom Brokaw, to a certain extent - the ability to not be tied to the desk anymore, but to do projects that are meaningful to you. "

" Not to get too deep on shaving my mustache, but it was kind of symbolic of, 'This is a moment of liberation, a chance to reinvent yourself.' That's kind of what I did. "

" Anybody who was in the military or a military family has a certain sensitivity to the separation. Everyone knows military wives have the hardest jobs. I was born into one. When I think back to those days, I didn't appreciate it then. "

" Everyone knows I'm black. I am who I am. This is the person that Lester Sr. and June Holt raised, and I make no apology for it. At the same time, I'm never going to pull a race card to get what I want. You can't have it both ways. "

" The problem with being a journalist is you go places and you're working. You don't get to appreciate everything. But I got enough of a sampler of South Africa; I thought, 'I want to come here when I don't have to interview people for a living so that I can really enjoy it.' Because I think it was just a magnificent place. "

" For 30 years I've been schooled in everything from government, and economics, to medicine and international relations. But don't be impressed. Someone once said being a general assignment reporter simply means you are equally ignorant about most everything. In other words, I know a little about a lot. "

" I'm a morning person, so rising at 4-something on weekends is not a huge challenge for me. I am not, however, much of a morning eater - not at that hour, at least. "

Lester Holt

Challenge

Person

" UC Merced is the University of California's newest campus and lies among farm fields in the San Joaquin Valley, 2 1/2 hours east of San Francisco and not far from where I spent most of my childhood. It's a part of California that has suffered deeply from the recession with high unemployment and a skyrocketing home foreclosure rate. "

" As a 13, - 14-year-old kid, I'd sit on my bed with a tape recorder and a newspaper. I would do my own newscast. I would practice my diction. "

" You can't exactly do it from your hotel room. It's the weather; you've got to get out in it. You're telling people that there are 70 mile-per-hour winds. So it's like, 'Let's prove it.' "

Lester Holt

Hotel

You

" You never know what doors are going to open up and why they are going to open up. You've got to be ready to walk through them. "

" What I've come to know is that in life, it's not always the questions we ask, but rather our ability to hear the answers that truly enriches our understanding. Never, never stop learning. "

" Sometimes, I'll be flipping the channel at home and think, 'Wow, there's a lot of me on TV.' "

Lester Holt

Home

" I reluctantly soldiered on to the raccoon. It actually would have tasted quite good had I not had the image of a raccoon rummaging through the garbage stuck in my head. "

" I really bristle when I get called to events and people introduce me as one of the top black anchors in the country. You know, that's very insulting. I'm striving to be one of the best anchors in the country. Handcuff me like that. What you're saying is, 'You're black. You should only expect to rise to the level of the best at being black.' "

Lester Holt

Best

Black

" You know there's some great folks, great story telling at 'Dateline,' and I'm glad to be a part of it. "

" I've never been one to carry race on my sleeve, and I've never been one to really use my race. "

" You have to go where the story is to report on it. As a journalist, you're essentially running to things that other people are running away from. "