“I started off working with Louis Armstrong and Ella Fitzgerald and Din...” — Leslie Uggams Quote

I started off working with Louis Armstrong and Ella Fitzgerald and Dinah Washington at 9. Then on to working with Elvis and Tom Jones and Frank Sinatra and Sammy Davis and Dean Martin. People like that. Then I got into theater and worked with Richard Kiley, James Earl Jones. Just extraordinary people.

My Aunt Eloise Uggams was my first inspiration. She performed on Broadway, and when I was 10 years old, I saw her in 'Porgy and Bess,' the first Broadway show I ever attended.

Everybody wanted to play the Apollo and have that on your resume. I played the Apollo up until I was 16 years old. Then when I went on to do other things, they were very proud of what I had accomplished.

I worked with a comic at the Apollo, and his jokes weren't so good. So people used to bring groceries to the Apollo, and you'd see it flying on the stage. It was crazy. Absolutely crazy.

I always respected Neil Armstrong highly. He was probably the coolest under pressure of anyone I ever had the privilege of flying with. I never saw him flustered.

I can tell you where I was when Kennedy was shot - which was in the common room at school. I heard about it on the old valve radio. At the time of Armstrong's landing, I was at university rehearsing a play.

Everyone should take their hats off to Neil Armstrong. He is a humble guy who doesn't wave his own flag.

Louis Armstrong was about playing with soul and emotion, not about showing how technically brilliant he was.

Lance Armstrong won seven Tours, that's 147 days of racing, and he never had a puncture or a mechanical. You can really minimise your chances of a mistake if you do everything right.