I'm coming from a Ginuwine and Usher background: slow and smooth songs. And that's why I really connected to Sam Cooke, because he was just very smooth. It's not like the James Brown types, which is all great stuff, but he was totally set apart from those guys.

Because my career has gone so fast, I haven't been able to become confident.

I knew I had a gift. I wanted the world to hear my music, and I wanted it to be my career, but I didn't know how to go about it.

The thought of me not having to clock in for a job anymore is something that I can't really put into words, aside from 'amazing' and 'awesome.'

For us, creativity means thinking about the lives of our audience and how to connect with them.

That's the most proud I have been: Seeing my family at the World Cup and them being able to watch me play and making them proud of me.

My big, growing family keeps everything balanced and grounded.

By the time I was 5, I was already an outcast. It was the early 1960s, and I was part of the only Jewish family in a decidedly Christian suburb of Waltham, Mass.