I was growing up at a time when music was growing and changing so fast. I had learned all the big band sounds of the 1940s, Glenn Miller, Tommy Dorsey. But then along came Chuck Berry, Les Paul, Fats Domino and I figured out how to make their music as well.

I'm Puerto Rican, but I represent everybody.

If I were to travel with all my instruments, I would need a truck.

I know Ritchie Valens in 1959 had 'La Bamba' but to be totally Spanish - because, you know, Ritchie didn't speak Spanish - but to be a total Latin artist like myself, to be out in a field where there weren't any categories for Latinos... I felt good that I was maybe - I didn't know it at the time - but I felt good that I opened the door.

Playing guitar was a calling, but I never realized that it was going to be a career. It was just something I did out of love.

As a Hispanic American, this country has done a lot for me, and I think that people have to be more grateful for what they have in this country.

The day I stop learning and I don't try to make myself better on the guitar, that's the day I hang it up and say, 'Goodbye.'

In 1966 I recorded my first bolero album. I was about 18 years old then and I recorded it because I wanted my parents to know that I hadn't lost my identity of being Latino.

I mean, it wasnt like I had said to myself beforehand, 'OK, I'm gonna go out there and sing 'The Star-Spangled Banner' in the weirdest way possible and cause a commotion.' I just sang it the way I felt it I sang it the only way I could.

It taught the English to speak Spanish and it taught the Spanish to speak English. If we had more songs such as that, it would solve the immigration problem in a hurry. But there can't be another 'Feliz Navidad.'

New York is really where my career somewhat started.

I'm lucky that I can play all kinds of music, that it appeals to all of the generations.

Some people wanted me deported - as if you can be deported to Puerto Rico.

It's a wonderful thing to play with symphony orchestras - I've played with many - but it's really special in Israel because you have so many great musicians.

I have no regrets, though I was the first artist to stylize the national anthem, and I got a lot of protests for it. I have no regrets. America has been good to me. I'm glad that I'm here.

I take pride in the fact that I was the first Hispanic artist to really crack the English market.

I did whole Latin albums and it was like Beatlemania for me in the Latin world, the screaming girls, not being able to leave the hotel, at the airport met by screaming fans. That was something!

I taught myself until I was about 16. And then I studied classical guitar with some teachers.

One day I heard Ray Charles on the radio and I found out he was blind. I thought, 'You know what, if there's room for Ray, there might be room for Jose.'

When I came on in '68, I was really the lone wolf.

Very few guitarists play nylon-string. They don't know how to get the sound out of them. That's something I've spent a lot of time on.

I have genuine respect for women and I want to win their respect. I don't want them to look at me and say, 'Oh, another man with the same attitudes as most men.'

I didn't mean for it to cause such a furor, but I was the first guy to ever do the national anthem with a guitar. Everyone else had the big brass band. Nowadays it's tracks that they sing to, but in my day, we had no tracks. And I was the only orchestra that I knew that was the best orchestra and that was me and my guitar.

New York will always be a part of me no matter where I go.