Michelle Obama

I want our young people to know that they matter, that they belong. So don’t be afraid. You hear me, young people? Don’t be afraid. Be focused. Be determined. Be hopeful. Be empowered. Empower yourself with a good education. Then get out there and use that education to build a country worthy of your boundless promise. Lead by example with hope; never fear.

Let us not forget: I didn’t just wake up First Lady… I mean, I went to law school, I practised law, I worked for the city, I ran a nonprofit (and) I was an executive at a hospital. I’ve been in the world. I’ve worked in every sector, and you don’t do that without coming up against some stuff. You know, having your feelings hurt, having people say things about you that aren’t true… Life hits you, so over the course of living, you learn how to protect yourself in it. You learn to take in what you need and get rid of the stuff that’s clearly not true.

We should always have three friends in our lives-one who walks ahead who we look up to and follow; one who walks beside us, who is with us every step of our journey; and then, one who we reach back for and bring along after we’ve cleared the way.

Women in particular need to keep an eye on their physical and mental health, because if we’re scurrying to and from appointments and errands, we don’t have a lot of time to take care of ourselves. We need to do a better job of putting ourselves higher on our own ‘to do’ list.

[on the 2016 election] When the most qualified person running was a woman, and look what we did instead, I mean that says something about where we are. That’s what we have to explore, because if we as women are still suspicious of one another, if we still have this crazy, crazy bar for each other that we don’t have for men… if we’re not comfortable with the notion that a woman could be our president compared to… what, then we have to have those conversations with ourselves as women.

It was sort of important for us not to deal with a specific policy change, or a specific sort of approach, but to deal with cultural change.

Once you start collecting records you learn more and more about Jazz and Blues.

It seems like I always had to work harder than other people. Those nights when everybody else is asleep, and you sit in your room trying to play scales.

I started playing piano when I was 6. And I knew that wanted to be involved in that form of expression, whether it was through music, or acting, or dancing, or painting, or writing.

Do it again on the next verse and people think you meant it.

Everybody came. Everybody came to the Cotton Club.

I would say that a composer writes music to express and communicate and put down in permanent form certain thoughts, emotions and states of being. The resultant work of art should speak to the men and women of the artist’s own time with a directness and immediacy of communicative power that no previous art expression can give.

The people who really got me off were dealing with the musical potential of their instrument.

It made no sense to ignore them and to continue writing as if they did not exist. I felt that it was worth the effort to see if I couldn’t say what I had to say in the simplest possible terms.

Jazz isn’t the kind of music you’re going to learn in 3 or 4 years or get because you have talent for music.

My dream is to do whatever I want without any interference from the record company.

I became a singer to sing my songs. They’re so hip who else is going to sing them?

I want a kick to my band, but I don’t want the rhythm to hog the spotlight.

A guy is influenced by hundreds of people and things, and all show up in his work. To fasten on any one or two is ridiculous. I will say one thing, though. Lennie Tristano’s early records impressed me tremendously. Tunes like ‘Tautology,’ ‘Marshmallow,’ and ‘Fishin’ Around.’ I heard the fellows in his group building their lines with a design and general structure that was different from anything I’d ever heard in jazz.

Dance music-as I keep saying, you can dance to a windshield wiper… a windshield wiper that’s fairly steady gives you a beat and all you need is an out-of-tune playing ‘Melancholy Baby’ and you’ve got dance music.

If I were to call it black music, that would be untrue. I don’t know what that is, unless it would be some African drums or something.