I also don't believe that "everything happens for a reason," which is in a similar category of world-views.

A day off after a show with no agenda in a foreign city is about the most fertile creative situation I can imagine. Just walking with nothing to do, killing time and hearing the sights and sounds of an unfamiliar place.

The first splurge of creativity is kind of free, and the last 30 percent is painstakingly hard work, but it's good to light a fire and make it public and create that expectation. It's become part of the writing process, really, a way to ask the audience what they think, how they think it's going. I can't write songs in a vacuum.

Well, my main instrument is violin, but I think of myself as a songwriter who happens to play violin.

Every time I get up in the morning, melodies occur to me and I start trying to shape lyrics to melodies.

Just don't let the human factor fail to be a factor at all

There's been this perception that Europeans still hold on to, that they discover the real talented ones in American culture and give them proper credit and that's not true anymore - it used to be. A lot of jazz musicians would get respect in Europe.