I was a guitar player first off.

I'm still trying to re-create a Ray Charles concert that I heard when I was fifteen years old, and all my nerve endings were fried and transformed, and electricity shot through me.

I think that it can be said of a lot of artists, and myself included, that we made the same record over and over from the beginning.

I am not a jazz singer. I wouldn't place myself on that footing. I wouldn't even enter that arena.

I feel fortunate that I was able to step away from it when I wasn't interested.

From the time I moved to San Francisco in 1967 to play with the Steve Miller Band, there was a lot of support in the music community for one cause or another, but this one was special because it was put on by people who understood where musicians hearts are.

Quite frankly, I've always listened to the black side of the radio dial. Where I grew up, there was a lot of it and there was a lot of live music around.