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" Ninety-nine percent of the music that was of any interest to me when I was growing up came out of the black community. "

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" As a melody instrument player, it's all about getting from one note to the next, and those intervals and how you navigate your way through these vertical structures of chords. You realize that everything's moving forward, and it's all linear. "

" Jazz music by its very nature is just a conglomerate of a lot of different kinds of music. "

" I have pretty ecumenical tastes. I'm interested in a lot of different kinds of music, so I don't listen with a jaundiced ear to music because it's in a certain category, whether it's country or opera or hip-hop or bebop or whatever it is. "

" You're only as good as your last record. "

" Well, I guess my unease with that is... I'm always a little uneasy with that phrase - smooth jazz, as opposed to what? "

" Jazz music should be inclusive. Smooth jazz to me rules out a certain kind of drama and a certain tension that I think all music needs. Especially jazz music, since improvising is one of the cornerstones of what jazz is. And when you smooth it out, you take all the drama out of it. "

" Its all about finding the right note at the right place and knowing when to leave well enough alone. And that's a lifelong quest. "

" When you see the same familiar faces, it's nice when you get a chance to play with the same musicians. You start to develop this shorthand so everybody knows where you're at and where you're going, but then again, there are always surprises. But the more people are comfortable with the material, the more free you can be with the music. "

" Instrumental music is increasingly marginalized and there's just no outlet, there's no venue for it, in terms of media. "

" I tend to play in a way that feels natural to me. To me that's authentic for myself. I play by where I'm led by some sense of where I feel I'm supposed to be. "

" My drummer, Gene Lake, is Oliver Lake's son. So I certainly have wide tastes, in not only what I listen to, but what I play as well. "

" I think a valid approach to being a musician is to take all of the experience of your life and filter it through your personality and send it back out there, and that's what art is. "

" When you have an acoustic bass in the ensemble it really changes the dynamic of the record because it kind of forces everybody to play with a greater degree of sensitivity and nuance because it just has a different kind of tone and spectrum than the electric bass. "

" I always wanna be in the process of evolving and growing. "

" I became a musician because I love music, and that is what has sustained me; it's not because I thought it was a great way to make a living. Music saved my life. "

" It's tough to be in a relationship with a musician, because it reads sometimes as this ego and self-involvement when it's really just concentration and focus. "

" While St. Louis is technically regarded as part of the Mid-West, it's actually - geographically and emotionally - more part of the South. I mean, the sensibility of St. Louis is really very much that of a Southern Mississippi river-town. "

" Everyone goes through the ups and downs of living - fretting about the future, worrying about what happened. Music teaches us how to be in the moment. "

" To me, the object of practicing is to allow you to play what you hear. But you're always hearing new things, so you never get to the end of it. "

" I kinda always wanted to be a tenor player, but I'm a small guy, and tenor was just too big. "

" It's always difficult to define what jazz is or what jazz isn't. To me, the only definition that I can think of is it's music where a lot of different elements are played at the same time. The harmonic, the melodic... You're pushing the boundaries on every level. That could be true of rhythm and blues as well. I'm a musician. "

" I try to do things that keep me interested. And play music that moves me. I like to move around and play in a lot of different ways. "

" Music is an expression of individuality; it's how you see the world. All art is, for that matter. You take how you experience the world, interpret it, and send it out there - express it - whether it's sculpture, dance or singing. "

" I think, in a lot of ways, it's easier to play a smaller room. You can exploit the quieter dynamics you would shy away from in larger venues. "

" In most of the stuff that I've done over the years as a sideman, I wasn't really a session musician, because to me, a session musician is a guy who makes his living in the studio, and I never really did that. "

" In regard to music, I just think that it's always best to have an attitude of being a perpetual student and always look to learn something new about music, because there's always something new to learn. Don't dismiss something out of hand because you think it's either beneath you or outside of the realm of where your interests lie. "

" When I make records, I never listen to stuff after it's done. Ever. "

" I didn't try to think what my audience wanted and then make the music accordingly. I made the music and hoped that as many people liked it as possible. "

" I look at the artistic process as like experiencing the world, channeling it through your personality and sending it back out there. That's the process. "

" I'm moved by a lot of different kinds of music, whether it's pop music or R&B or straight-ahead jazz or free or opera or music from all parts of the world. "