I believe, from reading biographies, that the great musicians have also been great cooks: Miles Davis, Dizzy Gillespie, Thelonious Monk, Max Roach. I think I’ve worked out why this is – unsociable hours, plus general creativity. Jamie Cullum Read Quote
My grandmother on my father’s side, a nightclub singer, was a Jewish refugee from Prussia who ended up in Jerusalem, where she met my grandfather – a British army officer. I remember as a child having bowls of chicken soup made by her. There were lots of interesting components, like feet and necks. Jamie Cullum Read Quote
My mother was born in Burma, but my grandfather on her side was Indian-Spanish. So I have this quite exotic mix, which is reflected in my earliest memories, in our Wiltshire country kitchen, of gran, and aunts, cooking spicy stewy, casseroley curries, a version of Indian food with a Burmese twist. Jamie Cullum Read Quote
Having kids sets a bomb off in your life. It really makes you examine who you are, what you believe in and what you want to be. And that is magical for creativity. Jamie Cullum Read Quote
People often say that having a family makes you make safer choices. It’s been the total opposite for me. It’s really made me want to make bolder choices. Jamie Cullum Read Quote
Most people in the U.K. discovered me playing a standard on Parkinson. In America, it was on VH1 singing an original called ‘All At Sea,’ which is a contemporary pop song. So the people that know me there tend to think of me in the singer/songwriter category. Jamie Cullum Read Quote
Oh, I was a real Nirvana kid. I got into jazz because I listened to a lot of metal, Megadeth and that, and those guys play really fast and are virtuosos. I wanted to learn more about it, and I discovered that a lot of jazz guys played really fast, too. Jamie Cullum Read Quote
I was thinking of applying to the ‘Guardian’ for a job after university. Yeah, I wanted to be one of the people who writes stories in G2. Jamie Cullum Read Quote
I never sought out a record deal. It caught me with my pants down. I was just a musician doing my thing, I didn’t even send my records out. Jamie Cullum Read Quote
