Quotes from Gregory Porter

I'm very grateful for the success of 'Take Me to the Alley.' The chart position it's reached around the world is very exciting, and its success is an example of the acceptance of my music. I am very thankful.

Because I am away so much, I try to establish home in people, rather than places. For example, wherever I get together with my brother the place we're in becomes home.

I think every person who gets a football scholarship thinks the potential for great success in college - and maybe even a career in the NFL - is possible.

My mother gave me the courage to pursue music as a career on her deathbed. She became very ill when I was 21. I didn't want her to worry about my future. I wanted her to know I'd finish my degree. But she pushed me to follow my dream, even if it wasn't the safe option.

When there's an imbalance in terms of what people get to hear, then that's negative. Then blues, jazz, it will die.

There's a lot of female singers and I don't want to dismiss them, but the male - and I have to be careful - the black male voice in jazz, whatever you say, is an important voice, because there's a tradition of the music that should be touched on, there's a sound that should be touched on.

The best career advice was to sing with an understanding and internalise the music - that was my mother's advice. Sing with intention, believe what it is you're saying, and think about it, before you sing it.

And I've made it a choice on my records that sometimes I leave the breath or the trailing note that sometimes falls into a flat or a sharp.

I was quite shy as a child. My sisters were the gang leaders, my brothers were the enforcers and I was a tag-a-long.

I'm happiest in nature, in trees, rivers, streams, and I'm happiest around my kid - you know that's the funny thing, he is not always in the best of moods, but I am always happiest around him and in nature. Around my family is where I am happiest.

One critic called me nothing but a blues singer, as though that was a slight. That is the highest compliment there is.

My sisters started to cook at nine and, being one of the youngest, I wanted in on it, too, so I began at six on potato-peeling duty as french fries were my thing.

The nice thing about living in a semi-small town is that I can just go home and switch off. I go home now and I trim roses, rake leaves, wake up early in the morning and scare the raccoons off the lawn! It's kinda nice, that's the way I turn off, in Bakersfield, California.

I was in rehab for nine months, and I needed some solace and distraction. I was in town one day and I sort of stumbled into a jazz jam session, and kept going back.

I had a long-term relationship that failed. I had some health issues. When you dip down emotionally you can gather some things that help you when you do rise. If you go through it and you're OK, you can develop some scars that help you in the time after.

My mother was a minister, so I grew up in a church. My grandfather was a minister; there are a bunch of ministers in my family.

What makes jazz different is that you can't predict it, it's all about freedom. Just when you think you know what you're going to hear there'll be a left turn, a jazz musician will change it up.

Even if you've being playing together for years, there'll always be something new. You're constantly back phrasing, front phrasing, singing faster, singing slower.

I've always thought that a Saturday morning at home should be education time. I mean fun education, for example learning to cook a dish or reading about something new. So I put on documentaries, get a bunch of magazines and newspapers and use the morning to make myself better.

I think part of my job as a songwriter is to go back in my memory and pull up those pains for other people because somebody else is going to come along who didn't have a good issue with their father.

As well as having a really strong message, sometimes an artist needs to couple their sentiment with something that's soulful and groovy to listen to.

Gospel music was very prevalent in my house. My mother also loved Nat King Cole. That was some of the first music that I heard. Mahalia Jackson, Nat King Cole and the Mississippi Mass Choir.

The funny thing about nationalism is that there are two sides to it. Some parts of it are beautiful, but there's an ugly side as well.

I think myself, Jose James, and Robert Glasper are expanding the language - really reminding people that the umbrella of jazz is large and all-encompassing.