It was challenging getting myself into the mindset to lose the weight. Once I got there, the weight dropped off quickly.

In this era, soul is not a sound or a color: it's an intention.

That's the kind of music I want SoulBird to represent: music with intelligence and heart, music that moves people in their souls and their bodies. Music with wings.

I always loved music, but I didn't know if I could be the kind of artist that makes a difference.

In Denver, all we really had was pop radio, so I grew up on all that late '70s pop stuff - Billy Joel, James Taylor, Lionel Richie, Elton John, Steve Miller and Toto. Great love songs and really hooky and melodic music - I have all of that stuff in my heart.

When I perform, I'm just very much just being myself.

You deal with what comes to you. If it's something you don't like, you deal with it the best you can. If it's something that you love, you rise to the occasion.

Neo-soul is really less about a sound than it is about a look, in my opinion.

If I don't have the right clothes, I feel weird walking out; I don't feel comfortable in what I have on. I have different colors that I want to wear on different days because it makes me feel different.

Just like the air you breathe or the water you drink, music shapes you. The trouble is, most people don't use it to spread love and healing. But I think music can make a social contribution if you're responsible with it.

It's not my place to say how Zoe Saldana perceives herself, and I can't say how anybody else perceives her, either. I see her as a black person of Hispanic origin, but I don't even know what that really means, because I don't know anything about race and Hispanic culture.

If we can just focus our attention where it matters, we can effect change.

I want to always be classy and honest, and I always want to have fun with music, and if I can't really express who I am through my music, then it's not really fun anymore.

Between '06 and '09, I dealt with pain by eating. And I was like, 'Oh, crap, eating makes you gain weight!'

Everybody has a spiritual body. Everybody has a physical body, and so your spiritual body is the stuff that holds all of your emotions like your body holds your organs, your food, your muscles, your water. Your spiritual body holds your emotional state and your mental state.

I'm really judgmental, especially about things that I feel make my life harder.

When someone is themselves through their music, it's soul music. James Taylor is soul music to me 'cause it's just him talking about him. It doesn't have anything to do with black or growing up in the church; it's where it comes from. It's just soul music.

For me, the healing process starts with graciousness and forgiveness.

Denying any person their humanity is a game we should all stop playing.

It's important to have a place where you can recharge. Everybody's is different, but I do think it should entail quiet because it needs to be where you hear your spirit most clearly. For me, that's the prayer room in my apartment. And since my home is 700 square feet, I mean the coat closet near the front door.

What I love about Christmas music is it stays around every year and comes back.

Why not be a person who is loving towards humankind as a whole and people as individuals?

You need to take care of you and fortify yourself and then move out to take care of others.

Listening to 'Songs in the Key of Life' always puts me in a good mood.