I feel I'm most successful when I'm playing a concert, and it doesn't necessarily seem like I'm playing a saxophone but am coming off more like an orchestra or something like that.

This is what really makes real jazz musicians: people coming out with their own voice.

I'm trying to learn to really use space. My philosophy is that every time you interrupt space in a very confident, secure manner, then music happens.

I'm the kind of guy that if I go to a concert and hear something that knocks me out, I don't want to be left out of that. I'm going to try to get into that, and I'm running back home to practice.

Poetry itself is music. I'm just lucky that I can convert it into music. William Blake is my favorite poet of all time, and he said that he wasn't quite familiar with the sounds of music. If so, he would have been a musician. All of his poems are all like songs, and that's how I always try to start my thoughts.

I'd say for a film composer, 'Star Wars' is kind of like the holy grail of film music. It's probably the best film music ever written.

What I would say to filmmakers, if I may be so bold or so arrogant, is to draw inspiration from other filmmakers, but go to the place in your own gut where everything is nothing. That's a very Zen thing to say, but that place of nothing is where real creativity comes out of.

The only limit to your impact is your imagination and commitment.