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I played the organ when I went to military school, when I was 10. They had a huge organ, the second-largest pipe organ in New York State. I loved all the buttons and the gadgets. I've always been a gadget man.

We really were a very musical family. Father managed to buy us a small pump organ, and I just loved this instrument.

I fell in love with the piano. I knew it was me. I was dying to play.

You know, my family is very musical, I was surrounded by it. And from four years old I was the one that asked my mother could I take piano lessons.

I was always playing the Hammond Organ back to front even during the days of the Nice, going back to 1968. Really what I was doing there, was choosing notes at random and trying to make some sense of them, improvising back to front.

I'd actually been making my living as an organist with bands since I was probably 15 or 16 years old, and then as a senior in high school I put together a jazz quintet called The Bobby Mack Jazz Quintet.

My mother played piano so we always had music around the house.

Piano playing is a dying art. I love the fact that I can be one guy with one instrument evoking an emotional and musical experience.

And I've played piano since I was little, so I was originally the piano player in the band.

Music was a central part of my childhood because my mother played organ and piano in the church, and that meant all us kids had to be in the church choir.