Pianist Aaron Parks on composition (“I love perfect asymmetry”), mathematics, thinking about touch, and no longer being the youngest person in the room.  

Pianist, composer and educator Kenny Werner on his life and career, the Effortless Mastery phenomenon, coming to terms with his own wisdom, and his newest record The Space, a solo piano project informed by his own teachings. He says, “Today I get a bigger kick from helping people with whatever wisdom I have than I do from playing. I finally accepted I have a wisdom that can really be useful. As musicians we’re not used to doing something that’s useful.”

Pianist, composer, educator and recording artist Fred Hersch on how the scene has changed over the years (“people drink less now”), learning to be gracious (“the audience needs to have their experience independent of how you feel about it”), education (“You can spend $200,000 on a jazz performance degree and not make that much money in the next 10 years”), songwriting (“I try to write tunes”), self reflection (““If I want to be the person I can be, I can’t worry about what people think”) and much more.

Saxophonist Rick Margitza on what it was like to be thrust into the jazz limelight overnight, working with Miles Davis, moving to France, dividing the octave and choosing the right note.