I studied chord theory and started playing the piano.

I started playing trumpet when I was 11 years old. All I wanted to be was a jazz trumpet player when I grew up.

I feel creatively vibrant. I have some great friends; I feel like I'm capable of giving a lot to the world. And ultimately, that's what I really care about, is just giving.

About 13-14 years ago, I went back to my alma mater, Fairfax High School, and ran into the music teacher. She invited me to come speak to the kids about the viability of a music career. When I went into the room where I used to play every day in a big orchestra, they had nothing!

Music gave me something that was not only good for me - it gave me something to work on, something to be proud of and something that I really loved and have a love for - but also music was good for other people because you put joy into the world.

When I was growing up, in L.A., I went to these schools, Fairfax High School, Bancroft Junior High School, and they had great music departments. I always played in the orchestra, the jazz band, the marching band.

The quality of instruction is very high at the Silverlake Conservatory of Music. It's not about being a rock star. It's about the fundamentals of music, theory and technique on a particular instrument, and playing in an ensemble or private setting.

A big part of my life is music education because it changed my life - but arts, academics and athletics should all be equally treated in the school.

You teach your kids about your beliefs and tell them what you think is right and the conclusions that you've come to from living in the world, and then they can make their own decisions.

I had a friend who had been teaching music for a long time, and he knew a bunch of teachers, so I just put up the money and started a school.

I love entertaining people, I love playing music, and I love rocking like an animal. But at a certain point, you're playing gig after gig after gig, in town after town after town, and you're lying down, staring at another hotel-room ceiling, and it's like, 'I want to be home. I'm a dad. I've got kids.'

It's fun to just get out there and have a nice conversation when I'm running. To be honest, when I do longer runs, the trail that I like to run up in Malibu has mountain lions, so I always feel I want to run with someone else.

I wanted to play in a band, and I wanted to do music for a living, and that's what I dedicated my life to.

Before every show, we get into a circle, hold hands, and someone makes a speech. Most bands are too cool for that.

Outside of a couple of times I ran without eating right or being too tired, I always feel great after I run.

I love my life and my mistakes and my triumphs - all of it.

I like the idea of acting. Of all these things I've done, sometimes I think I've done well, and sometimes I think I didn't do well, but they are more cameos, and I come in and be crazy.

Running opened up something beautiful in my life. I try to send the energy all over my body. I love the feeling of it.

The Silverlake Conservatory is a nonprofit music school in Los Angeles where we teach music, mostly to kids, but to people of all ages - people who are old, people with beards, all kinds of people.

I played trumpet in the school bands. I learned things I liked to play on my trumpet, but I didn't learn why this note goes with this note and why it produces that sound. Or how to create tension in the composition.

I'm always put in the unfortunate position of asking people to donate money and people I know in bands to play benefit concerts and all this stuff.

When Hillel died, it was during one of the happiest times of my life. I was married and completely in love and had a baby on the way.

I was on a path that could've really led to disaster, and the one thing for me that really kept me focused and gave me something to believe in and a sense of self-worth and a discipline was music.

Turning 50 is a little bit of a 'taking stock' moment. I feel probably a little dumber. I don't think I'm as sharp as I was when I was younger, but I'm definitely wiser and less likely to make gigantic blunders of an intellectual, spiritual, emotional or physical type.