I know there are more gifted people than me out there. But they may not make it in the music world even if they have the talent, because they don’t have the desire and the ego to drive themselves as hard as they can. Or because they’ve gotten derailed along the line and can’t find their way back to their real goals. Or because they didn’t have the parents I had to foster their talents.

Marvin Hamlisch and Gerald Gardner, The way I was, New York : Toronto : New York, 1992, p. 23