Grover Washington was my main influence, and when I went to college, I started listening to more of the jazz masters like Sonny Rollins, Cannonball Adderley, and John Coltrane.
I don't think I've ever been true to jazz. There's always a kind of jazz element to what I do. There are a very few genres that I haven't tried out, really, in what I've been doing. As a jazz musician, you can kind of mess about with things with a certain level of musicianship, which helps.
I just try to do as good job with the material as I can and play some jazz as well, some improvised music, and do that every night. Just see where it goes.
When I was 12, I began listening to John Coltrane and I developed a love for jazz, which I still have more and more each year.
Jazz is very much a part of my life. I work with the Thelonious Monk Institute and do the artwork for their program every year.
Jazz music, as is also the case with the old down-home spirituals, gospel and jubilee songs, jumps, shouts and moans, is essentially an American vernacular or idiomatic modification of musical conventions imported from Europe, beginning back during the time of the early settlers of the original colonies.
One of the things that's clear to me from interviews that I've read is that the more popular successful jazz musicians had audiences above and beyond the music community.
In high school, I was always into Jerry Lee Lewis, and they decided they needed a piano player for the jazz band. I had my little boogie-woogie thing that I did, so I did my little boogie-woogie thing. I had a very high-pitched voice.
I still find it hard to believe that the whole era of jazz is over.
In the Bay Area, there was a resurgence of Dixieland jazz in the '40s - there was the Frisco Jazz Band, and Lu Watters and the Yerba Buena Jazz Band.
The history of jazz lets us know that this period in our history is not the only period we've come through together. If we truly understood the history of our national arts, we'd know that we have mutual aspirations, a shared history, in good times and bad.
New Orleans jazz is a complex and embracing art form that began about the same time as the blues and encompassed many of its excellences.
People want to have access to jazz because it has a vibe that's very strong.
Good jazz has been a big part of my life as far as my interest in music, and... It's kind of weird now with music, the way technology is, with downloading and iPods and electronic distribution, and its kind of - you miss something, I think.
I got my first set of drums when I was around 3. I went from band to marching band to Latin jazz band - it's like riding a bike.
Since my father is a musician as well, he taught me growing up that if you can play jazz, you can learn all instruments and write on them. He wanted me to be a songwriter that can do anything in any genre. I'm all about doing every genre.
I went to a performing arts school, and we studied musical theater, jazz vocal performance, and they kind of start you out on those things because they feel like it is a good foundation, and it was.
I always leaned toward free jazz... experimental jazz and progressive jazz. I feel like jazz is just part of the flavor and palette that you have as a musician to experiment with.
I think with me and the type of music that I'm trying to make, it's always going be soulful because I grew up listening to different types and variations of soulful melodies and jazz, but experimenting with different types of stylistic souls.
I was lucky enough to grow up in an era when radio was less formatted. It was really special. You could hear a jazz song then a pop song then a show tune then some jazz. Basically, whatever the DJ felt like playing, he would play. He was educating you and exposing you to things you would never hear otherwise.
I love nineties stuff like Alice in Chains and Nine Inch Nails. It'd be my dream to have a Radiohead-themed episode of 'Glee.' I also love jazz greats like Coltrane, Miles Davis, and Herbie Hancock.
I'm a country musician. I know how to play jazz, and I can play rock. But I've had to fight my entire career to get a little respect from people who don't understand where I come from.
And I played in jazz band as well during all three years in school.
The whole world loves American movies, blue jeans, jazz and rock and roll. It is probably a better way to get to know our country than by what politicians or airline commercials represent.
I would love to do a biopic of a famous singer, like Diana Ross or Donna Summer, or an old jazz story that we haven't seen before. I would love to do that! I would love to play Diana Ross 'cause she's an icon. I'm salivating to do that.
Cultures have long heard wisdom in non-human voices: Apollo, god of music, medicine and knowledge, came to Delphi in the form of a dolphin. But dolphins, which fill the oceans with blipping and chirping, and whales, which mew and caw in ultramarine jazz - a true rhapsody in blue - are hunted to the edge of silence.
The blues is the foundation, and it's got to carry the top. The other part of the scene, the rock 'n' roll and the jazz, are the walls of the blues.
The only time I've ever really felt envy is when I've watched people make music, which made my time living in the now-legendary Jazz Loft at 821 Sixth Avenue in New York a constant source of agony and ecstasy!
I usually listen to surf music, not much instrumental music, and when I was younger I listened to jazz.
By the time I was in my teens, I was listening to Delta blues and jazz.
I believe that blues and jazz are the two uniquely American contributions into music.
I want to expand jazz; I don't want to keep the audience limited. I want to reach people who have never come to a jazz concert before. One way to do that is by making records that have a lot of different kinds of music on them.
Shoes are a big part of your look. I think that if your outfit isn't really something special, then fun footwear is a great way to jazz it up and make your ensemble more interesting.
I think jazz is actually quite unforgiving in its disdain for nostalgia. It demands creativity and change at its highest level.
I'm not really a country singer, although I did make a couple albums and love its simple, straight-from-the-heart approach, but I have always sung a lot of jazz, show tunes, pop tunes, gospel and blues.
It's pretty rare in jazz to have a full-on steady band.
