Hip-hop is all over the planet.

Being vulnerable is allowing yourself to trust. That's hard for a lot of people to do. They feel a lot more secure if they kind of put walls around themselves. Then they don't have to trust anybody but themselves.

Forget about trying to compete with someone else. Create your own pathway. Create your own new vision.

I’m very conscious of the idea of trying to each time present something that I haven’t presented before. It’s a challenge to me to find something new, to find something innovative, but it’s also very exciting.

I’ve always been interested in science. I used to take watches apart and clocks apart, and there’s little screws, and a little this and that, and I found out if I dropped one of them, that thing ain’t gonna work.

I started off with classical music, and I got into jazz when I was about 14 years old. And I’ve been playing jazz ever since.

Clare Fischer was a major influence on my harmonic concept. He and Bill Evans, and Ravel and Gil Evans, finally. You know, that’s where it really came from. Almost all of the harmony that I play can be traced to one of those four people and whoever their influences were.

It’s not exclusive, but inclusive, which is the whole spirit of jazz.

I’m aware that a lot of what is happening in jazz has not had a very dynamic change in a long time.

I try stuff. I synthesize what’s of value with some of the other things I have at my disposal.