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" My grandparents on my father's side came to this country from the Caribbean with a strong connection to Africa and no shame about it. "

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" I've got tons more stuff to do. "

" My parents grew up during the Harlem renaissance. "

" It's very interesting, the dynamics of popularity. When you do something all the time, you don't worry about whether it's trendy or not. "

" All the music that I play today, I actually heard either at home or in my neighborhood when I was growing up in the '40s and '50s. "

" I'm doing exactly what I always wanted to do, and I still like what I can do musically. "

" As a kid, I always felt connected to Africa; it was something I was very proud of. "

" What the future of the planet and music and art and all of it is sharing; it's diversity. "

" I don't care if it's somebody else's song. Most of the time, you'll find that I'll put my own stamp on it. But I started writing more because, you know, it's easy to regurgitate what somebody else is doing, but it's exciting to be able to come up with your own writing. "

" I came up not understanding that a lot of people didn't start to hear music until they went to college or were turned on by an older brother or sister. "

" I'm always cracking up when I hear what people think I should be doing. "

" If the Rolling Stones are playing a concert across town, that's not my audience anyways. But I do find that there's a lot of people coming back around to see me again. "

" When I was 5 or 6, I was messing around with the piano, and I listened to everything from Chopin to boogie-woogie. "

" It's just like heirloom tomatoes; this is heirloom music. We used to have all kinds of diversity in our poultry, in our vegetables, in our fruits, and slowly but surely the monoculture beast comes in. I'm saying that's not a good idea. And if it means that I gotta do it on my own, then I do it on my own. "

" More and more people are finally realizing that in the heart of America, there's all this incredible music that wasn't widely heard before because it wasn't in the interest of those who feel they have to control the taste of the wider public. "

" It's pretty exciting. An honorary doctorate of the arts. It doesn't get any better. "

" I wanted to explore the connections between different kinds of music. "

" My perspective is cultural and world-based. It's always been a global perspective. "

" I didn't want to fall into the trap of complacency. "

" I'm a composer, man. "

" I'm perceived as someone who goes out and searches for new music, but it was all present in my household. "

" Very old music is, like, 11th century in my mind. That's very old. "

" I see myself as a composer who plays music and likes to play with other people, and not just as a solo artist. "

" If what you're talking about is seeing someone perform, then I'll have to say that in the rhythm-and-blues side of things, seein' Otis Redding live was it, you know? "

" Naw, it - it never stops, man... You gotta be doing what you're supposed to be doing - whenever, however it's coming down, you know. If you're getting your butt kicked - you still gotta do what you gotta be doing. "

" Particularly with the blues, it's not just about bad times. It's about the healing spirit. "

" I'm old enough to chew my peas and corn without choking. "

" The blues is played everywhere. There's no place I've been where they don't have blues or aren't interested in blues. "

" I've only been on MTV once as one of their 'Closet Classics,' with some bootleg footage of a 1970 tour I did in Holland. They didn't know what to make of my music, but they finally invented a name for it - world beat music. "

" In looking out into the world, it didn't look all that nice out there. And who were the nice people? Certainly Mahatma Gandhi was. "

" As I got more involved in music, one of the things that made me excited, from the time I was a child, was that clear link between our ancestors and the sounds we hear today. "