I … started out to become a jazz pianist; in the meantime I started singing and I sang the way I felt and that's just the way it came out.
I was a little confused as a kid because I grew up with my mom, and my mom is black. So, I was cultured in a very 'black' way. But when I go to school, I'm getting called 'white.' They would look at me, and they would curse me out. I didn't understand. I just knew I saw people of all different shades, and I was light. Now, I'm in a much bigger world.
The song ‘With a Little Help From My Friends’ was written speci?cally for me, but they had one line that I wouldn’t sing. It was ‘What would you do if I sang out of tune? Would you stand up and throw tomatoes at me?’ I said, ‘There’s not a chance in hell am I going to sing this line,’ because we still had lots of really deep memories of the kids throwing jelly beans and toys on stage; and I thought that that if we ever did get out there again, I was not going to be bombarded with tomatoes.
Jazz was my passion for a little while. I felt that all other kinds of music were stupid when I was into jazz. But I got over the addiction very soon
Adults are always asking little kids what they want to be when they grow up ’cause they’re looking for ideas.
The future's a weirder place than we thought it would be when we were little kids.
When I was a little kid I thought like a little kid, but now I'm five I know everything.
For a long time I thought I knew for sure who I was. I grew up in New Orleans and became a comedian. And there was everything that came along with that. The nightclubs. The smoking. The drinking. Then I turned 13.
As a little kid growing up in Hollywood, I was called 'a little crazy'. And now I guess I'm still that way.
I like singing in the street, so if you saw a little Indian kid walking on the street singing loudly, that was probably me.