I know I had my equivalents in Adrian Lester and Lenny James when I was at drama school. I remember David Harewood doing 'Othello' at the National and Adrian Lester having done Cheek by Jowl's famous 'As You Like It and Company' at the Donmar. Not necessarily performances I saw but just the fact they happened was massively encouraging.

I was a shy kid but somehow I knew I would make it as a performer. I'd always be telling my mum that I was going to be a famous singer. In my school yearbooks I would write 'Remember me when I'm famous.' I knew I had a gift.

My wife Elizabeth and I started The Really Terrible Orchestra for people like us who are pretty hopeless musicians who would like to play in an orchestra. It has been a great success. We give performances we've become the most famous bad orchestra in the world.

Touring is tough. You're almost in a haze because you don't really know where you are half the time: You're in a hotel room one moment and the next thing you know you're onstage performing for 60 000 people then you're back on an airplane. It's very hectic and I couldn't do it without my family.

When I heard the royal family wanted to have me perform in celebration of Prince William's marriage I knew I had to give them a little something. 'Wet' is the perfect anthem for Prince William or any playa to get the club smokin'.

Playing guitar was one of my childhood hobbies and I had played a little at school and at camp. My parents would drag me out to perform for my family like all parents do but it was a hobby - nothing more.

The United States have fulfilled in good faith all their treaty stipulations with the Indian tribes and have in every other instance insisted upon a like performance of their obligations.

Over the years my mother's steadfast faith in God has inspired me particularly when I had to perform extremely difficult surgical procedures or when I found myself faced with my own medical scare.

Practice means to perform over and over again in the face of all obstacles some act of vision of faith of desire. Practice is a means of inviting the perfection desired.

Most of the work performed by a development engineer results in failure.