My view is that you cannot close your mind and say I don't want to listen to this or that. Because if you can't appreciate the bad for being bad, you can't appreciate the good. If you turn a deaf ear to everything but one style, pretty soon it's not going to work out.

Today the kids that are out now they make a hit record and they put them right out on the stage with 10,000 people out there and they don't know anything about the business yet.

If you want to be a doctor, a lawyer you must go to college. But if you want to be a musician or such, study your craft. Study music.

... Geniuses have a little extra something. There's that little something that you know is a little different.

I think a song that's got something to say. I'm not much on gimmicks. I never have been because they don't last. But I like a song that tells a story and has some meat to it, you know, that means something.

I was so enamored with the idea of being in show business so everything was bright to me. I mean, I didn't think of it as being tough and things like that.

I don't have perfect pitch, but I have relative pitch. I'm glad I don't have perfect pitch because perfect pitch can drive you crazy.