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I didn't know what the hell Charlie Parker was playing... I just liked the way he played.

Bernstein grew up in my building in New York. He's a very, very fine player. When he was a kid, he came by to find out what was going on in the world of jazz.

Once I tried to find myself as a musician and a composer, I went back and saw that there was something special about Puerto Rican music. I knew that before, but had never sat down and thought about it. The more I learned about it, the more it found its way into the music I was writing.

As a very small girl, I listened to Charlie Parker and loved him and Max Roach and people like that.

My style is a little quirky. I can't play as fast as most professional jazz players.

In fact, I heard Bird first, and had got well into listening to him. You know, it's the kind of accidental thing that awareness of a player is: what's available, what somebody happens to play for you.

Even if I wasn't in music, even if my father was a carpenter, some guy in Jamaica would go 'You're just like Bob. You're just like your father.' That happens in Jamaica all the time.

When you're in Jamaica, unless you're in a tourist spot, you don't hear Bob Marley; you mostly hear dance hall music.

I dare anyone to play like Charlie Watts.

When I was in the country and I was trying to play, nobody seemed to pay too much attention to me. People used to say, 'That's just that ole blues singer.'