It may be that my most helpful contributions to music aren't my compact discs but my articles about other great singers of the past for American Heritage magazine. ↗
Back when I was in theater school, trying to figure out what I was going to do with my life, 'Sweeney Todd' was a huge touchstone for me, my favorite musical for sure. ↗
I'm really fed up with all the credibility talk. A lot of times it seems to be more important than the music. Well, I guess for a lot of people it actually is. We don't care for credibility. ↗
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. ↗
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. ↗
I certainly understand that we're all trying to make a living, but I'm not thinking about that when I'm making it. And if that's your sole motivation, it's going to reflect that narcissistic greed, and you're going to hear it in the music. ↗
