First I was a European-style player, then I was a downtown 'noise guy,' and now some people call me an Americana guy.

For me the music community was always like a model for what could be. The way people would play together, just harmony and being - old guys and young guys, black guys and white guys. It was setting an example for what the rest of us could be.

First I was a European-style player, then I was a downtown 'noise guy,' and now some people call me an Americana guy.

I can write the stuff and play it myself and have something in my head, but the best feeling is when somebody else plays it and they're hearing something other than what I'm hearing.

I feel so lucky that my high school was right in the middle of Denver, which is one of those sort of segregated towns, with black and white and Hispanic neighborhoods. But the school I went to was right in the middle of the whole thing.

"Music, for me, has always been a place where anything is possible--a refuge, a magical world where anyone can go, where all kinds of people can come together, and anything can happen. We are limited only by our imaginations.

Music doesn't hurt anybody, that's what's amazing. Everything is in there, every kind of human emotion, from the darkest to the lightest. And it has power. Unbelievable power.