I find it very difficult to compose when I’m not playing.

With four people you can create one very strong kind of energy, but if you can get 65 people working together, and swinging together, that’s a whole other kind of energy.

Not with the Rochester Philharmonic, but I formed my own orchestra, made up of musicians from the Eastman School, where I’m on the faculty now, direct the Jazz Ensemble and teach improvisation classes.

Because I don’t believe music can be free unless it has something to be free from.

I was blessed to work with The Jazz Messengers when the two piano players were Keith Jarrett and Chick Corea.

I do not mind having written the song at all. I just wish that I had written it in a different key, as the high d is hard to play. I am glad that I wrote something that brought joy to millions of people.

My brother had a big band in high school; after that we continued to play together, eventually forming a group called the Jazz Brothers, that recorded for Riverside Records.

I made many studio albums and I think the danger of studio recording is that if you do not watch out, you come out with a perfectly sterile performance.

A studio recording is perfection, but emotion and passion come only when you turn on the machine and go for the groove. If you do that with no mistakes, it sounds beautiful.

My music has always been strong in melodic content.

In 1994, I started touring again and I recorded two albums for Chesky Jazz.

I tend to not want to put labels or categories on the music, only because people come with preconceived ideas about what they’re going to hear, or won’t come for this reason.

I have been recording for five decades now.

To pay 60 musicians for rehearsal and performance is quite something, and I decided I wouldn’t be able to handle that kind of situation financially again, unless somebody else was taking care of that end of it.

Brazilian music has many of the ingredients that I strive for in my own music: Strong melodies and a disciplined but intense rhythmic concept, and interesting harmonies.

The hiatus you spoke about happened in 1998. I was somewhat numb from being out on the road every night. I had to stop because I was emotionally and physically drained.

To do it always right, that is what music is to me.

Whether it’s string writing or whatever, I try to write for what each instrumentalist can do best.

What’s happened – in our country, anyhow – is that the young people have shied away from the formality of the concert hall, that tie – and – tails philharmonic image.

I am glad that I wrote something that brought joy to millions of people.

I write music people enjoy playing and listening to, and I have a group that loves playing the music.

Not compromising the music, but there is a way, by just showing the people that you’re sincere and honest with what you’re doing, and by talking to them.

My goal was never to sell many records.

Most recently we’ve been working in concert situations rather than clubs. because there aren’t too many rooms there like Ronnie Scott’s, that are pure music rooms, where people come specifically to listen to music.

As for the symphonic activities… when I was a student at the Eastman School of Music, I became exposed to a lot more musical forms, elements, opportunities, and I fell in love with strings and their uses.

Music is meant to be a beautiful thing.

There’s not much in the way of written-down arrangements – just things that Gerry and I have worked out, from playing spontaneously together and hanging on to whatever seems to fall in right.

Then I loved the fact that we were actually recording live.

1972 was a year of many pleasant and rewarding experiences for me:

I can count on one hand the number of instrumental hits there have been over the last ten years.

I find it very difficult to compose when I’m not playing.

We may play in a contemporary rock vein, use standard bebop themes, and many other things besides.