 I do a lot of performing, but don't get a chance to go to the studio and write good music. |
| It's not that I don't love the song. My songs are like my children: some you want around and some you want to send off to college as soon as possible. |
| I want to write a book of poetry, as well as children's stories. |
| If I can bring joy into the world, if I can get people to stop thinking about their pain for a moment, or the fact the tomorrow morning they're going to get up and tell their boss off... then I'll be successful. |
| My father was a very disciplined singer who worked hard at his craft, and I was around that growing up. |
| But, if there's any aspect of my career that needs attention, it's writing. |
| The true musician is to bring light into people's hearts. |
| Seriously though, my father was the first African American to sign a contract with the Metropolitan Opera so I grew up with classical music and jazz in the home all the time. |
| I like a very dark house, just black. I sit there and just think. Once I'm still and quiet inside, I'll begin. It's very personal; it has to be. One song may be Bach, the next blues, a song from TV, or a nursery rhyme or jazz piece. |
| Then when I was in grammar school I played the clarinet, and then, after clarinet I played the flute in college orchestra - besides singing in the college chorus and things like that. |
| My biggest musical influences are probably my parents. |
| I don't want anything to get in the way of me and my singing. I want my mind as clear as possible. |
| Then I came up with this crazy idea just to walk out on the stage with no band at all and just start singing whatever came to mind. I actually fought the idea for a while because it seemed almost too radical, but it became obvious what I was supposed to be doing. |
| I played piano as a kid; I still play a little bit. |
| I did the one concert, and I was not bitten by the conducting bug, and I thought I was done, but then the phone started to ring, and gradually, over time, I started conducting more and more. Now a third of my performances are with orchestras. |
| Well, I started conducting kind of by accident. I wanted to give myself a special birthday present for my fortieth birthday, and I was living in San Francisco at the time and I started attending some of the concerts and then simply dropping hints. |
| I have a lot of albums yet to do. |
| When I'm on stage by myself, I don't have to think about anything. I don't have to worry about anything because I'm not responsible for anything except just opening my mouth and making sure music comes out. |
| Part of our responsibility as parents, as adults, is to set examples for children. But we have to like children in order to be really happy fulfilled adults. |
| Then I left that school and I went to Cerritos College, which was in southern California; they had one of the best big band programs in the country at the time. |
