In My View, Africa's Real Problems Are

I Had To Run Away From Home In Order To Be A Musician. Because I Came From A Family Of... My Father Was A Health Inspector; My Mother Was A Social Worker. And I Was Pretty Smart In School. So They Expected Me To Be Some Kind Of Academic - Schoolteacher, Or Doctor, Lawyer - And They Were Very Disappointed When I Told Them I Wanted To Be A Musician.

I Lived For Music Since I Could Think.

I Think That Anybody From The 20th Century, Up To Now, Has To Be Aware That If It Wasn't For Louis Armstrong, We'd All Be Wearing Powdered Wigs. I Think That Louis Armstrong Loosened The World, Helped People To Be Able To Say "yeah," And To Walk With A Little Dip In Their Hip. Before Louis Armstrong, The World Was Definitely Square, Just Like Christopher Columbus Thought.

I've Got To Where I Am In Life Not Because Of Something I Brought To The World But Through Something I Found - The Wealth Of African Culture.

I've Always Stood On One Fact - That All Over The World, There Are Only Two Things, The Establishment And The Poor People. The Poor People Are A Massive Majority And Across The World They Are Exploited In Different Kinds Of Ways. The Establishment Depends On Exploiting Raw Materials And The Poor.