Now I get exposure first with people directly in the clubs. This is a unique situation for me.

DJs and people in the street know what they like.

Most musicians count at the beginning, and never count and talk to their musicians after that. They only talk to them at the end of the song. But I would count with them and talk.

Soul has no musical geographical or racial boundaries.

I was being an artist, being sensitive and technical as artists are. I'm sure Leonardo Da Vinci did that. Artists don't always feel the same as others feel about their work.

Now I get exposure first with people directly in the clubs. This is a unique situation for me.

I've been sampled so much and I'm glad it's happened, it's a great compliment.

What we call soul has been around a long time. It comes out of a particular culture that is African in origin, but influenced by 250 years of slavery, as well as other forms of racial oppression.

Artists don't always know. Almost every song I ever recorded that was a hit at the majors that the promotional people picked I didn't think it would be a hit. I was wrong every time!

I'm celebrating my 40th year in show business this year.

I was with PolyGram; that was the big label that I was with for the longest, like 12 years.

A lot of the hip hop artists don't write music. They write words.

The majors, they have to control the distribution, the record outlets, the radio and, in some cases, even the venues. And downloading and pirating have also put pressure on the majors.

It's a wonderful feeling just being in this creative motif.

I couldn't get my album played over the so-called smooth jazz stations. Jazz stations would not play it. You don't always know who you're making that soul connection with.

I'd definitely love to play in Nashville again. That would be really good.

Having good health, being able to breathe and be happy, that's one of the most beautiful gifts. On top of that, I have the gift to play music and make people happy through that. I'm just telling you from my heart, I'm so in love with life.

I still look good. I'm trippin', but people tell me that all the time. So check it out, I'm 63, and still kicking. I've been putting records out every year.

I don't like rap that you can't understand. The youth is so quick and alert.

Back in the day, I used to be in the studio recording 20 hours a day. And that was all of the time. I still record a lot of hours, but I don't go as long as I used to.

I don't trip on that much. I just like to enjoy life and be happy.

When I was recording from '70 to '82, I always played piano and laid the tracks down. But I used to talk to the other musicians while the track was playing.

You grow and learn a lot about the industry and what happens behind closed doors over the years.

The true beauty of music is that it connects people. It carries a message, and we, the musicians, are the messengers.

People are always defining and re-defining music. My style of playing has been characterized as smooth jazz and acid jazz. I listen as I play; I'm not caught up in defining the type of music I play.

I generally sell my records online or at the show. You can undersell the distributor and the stores, and people know what they're getting cause they've just seen you live.

I always had this energy level that made me want to come to New York.

Most artists have contracts directly with the record company, and when they do music, all of their music is owned by the record company. But I did mine through a production company.

People in England were coming up to me, saying, My mother and father turned me on to your music. This happened to me 20 years ago. When I was 40 they were saying that.

I think music all the time.

I don't think I'm really so unique. If every black person looked at their life they would quickly discover that they have been influenced by every type of music prevalent in America.

Only a certain number of people go to a store over the period of a year. When a person sees my record on the shelf, it eliminates someone else's record from being sold. It's about continuing to try to find new ways to sell records.

Some people really trip on success or popularity. My friends would talk to me about that, about tripping on all this stuff, but you know what I tripped on? I started buying property.

The principal rule of art is to please and to move. All the other rules were created to achieve this first one.

All enterprises that are entered into with indiscreet zeal may be pursued with great vigor at first, but are sure to collapse in the end.

Let me first state that I believe that marriage is a sacred union between one man and one woman.

Entropy theory is indeed a first attempt to deal with global form; but it has not been dealing with structure. All it says is that a large sum of elements may have properties not found in a smaller sample of them.

There is no need to do any housework at all. After the first four years the dirt doesn't get any worse.

The avantgarde are people who don't exactly know where they want to go, but are the first to get there.

I never taste the wine first in restaurants, I just ask the waiter to pour.

After the first miscarriage, I tried to take the attitude that it was my body's way of telling me that this pregnancy wasn't meant to be.

Before and during the first phase of the war his administration repeatedly maligned the UN but now, that Iraq has turned into a quagmire, it is asking the UN for help.

You look at the whole Human Rights questions, I happened to be there at just the right time when the country was awakening - this goes to the first question you asked - the whole country was awakening to a hundred years of injustice that hadn't been resolved yet.

So, first you have to be able to play with a metronome. Then you take your freedom. If you play in an orchestra, you got to watch the conductor, he is like a metronome, but it is more difficult because he can change rhythms.

My first figure was a SLAYER eagle. And the dragons and the tribals are all I have got.

We're parents first, and once you have kids, everybody knows that you have priority lists. Number one is your family and everything else just kind of finds its place.

Everything has to be pulling weight in a short story for it to be really of the first order.

But in the first Gulf war the United Kingdom was not under any threat from Iraq, and is still less so in the second one. Then there is no justification for obstructing freedom of information, particularly as nations have a right to know what their soldiers are being used for.

I sort of understood that when I first started: that you shouldn't repeat a success. Very often you're going to, and maybe the first time you do, it works. And you love it. But then you're trapped.