Don't Settle For Style. Succeed In Substance.

In The Jazz At Lincoln Center Orchestra We Play Such A Diversity Of Music, With 10 Arrangers In The Band, We Don't Really Worry About Whether It's Contemporary Or Not.

It's Like We're Suffering From An Identity Crisis, And That Identity Is In Our Arts And The Fact That We Don't Find It Chief Amongst Our Agendas To Teach Our Kids Who We Are As A Nation And The Battles We've Had On This Ground And How They've Been Successfully Resolved. We Can't Enjoy The Fruits Of The Labor Of Our Ancestors.

It's Our Job To Just Do As Much As We Can To Enlighten The People About It And To Represent It By Playing It With Some Integrity. That's What I Try To Do.

The Young Very Seldom Lead Anything In Our Country Today. It's Been Quite Some Time Since A Younger Generation Pushed An Older One To A Higher Standard.

I Didn't Want To Get That Ring Around My Lips From Practicing The Trumpet, Because I Thought The Girls Wouldn't Like Me. So I Never Practiced.