[O]ne evening in a Los Angeles nightclub… I found myself face to face with Art Tatum. I was dazed, like I had been hit by thunder. This was my god before me. And I couldn't utter a word. Couldn't tell him how much I loved him, couldn't let him know that I had listened to all his records. I just stood there with my mouth open like an idiot… When I was twenty, he was still an example of what I might have accomplished if I had studied only the piano. He showed me what could really be done with eighty-eight keys, the way Charlie Parker showed saxophonists the way to play their horns. Listening to Tatum, I was constantly reminded of how little I could play. He kept me humble. << less