In '68 I was 13 years old, so I was a child, but I felt a lot of excitement in listening to things, looking at the pop art coming over from America. My father was an art collector, and he was coming home with these strange pieces of art that weren't exposed in museums. At the time, it was quite revolutionary, very adventurous.

I feel a vocabulary in my music that is coming from popular music. Popular music is like the mother of all languages.

I am very happy to be able to cross borders to go to China, to Mexico, to America, everywhere, and there is an instant understanding of what I do. This is incredibly beautiful because you've suddenly communicated with everyone without speaking the same language. The language of music is able to go anywhere.

I always get excited by the idea of adventure, of doing something different.

The best thing about writing programs is that it rationalized the apprenticeship of a writer.

Parks are works of art just as a painting or sculpture is.

You have to just go with your imagination, where your instinct takes you.

Without going outside his race, and even among the better classes with their 'white' culture and conscious American manners, but still Negro enough to be different, there is sufficient matter to furnish a black artist with a lifetime of creative work.