Everyone has their own sound, and if you're heard enough, folks will come to recognize it. Style however, is a different thing. Try to express your own ideas. It's much more difficult to do, but the rewards are there if you're good enough to pull it off.

When I was a little boy, I told my dad, 'When I grow up, I want to be a musician.' My dad said: 'You can't do both, Son'.

You shape your own destiny.

Everyone has their own sound, and if you're heard enough, folks will come to recognize it. Style however, is a different thing. Try to express your own ideas. It's much more difficult to do, but the rewards are there if you're good enough to pull it off.

The last song I recorded with [Hank Williams, Sr.] was "I'll Never Get Out of This World Alive." I remember thinking, "Hoss, you're not just jivin'," because he was so weak that all he could do was sing a few lines and then just fall in the chair.

A long apprenticeship is the most logical way to success. The only alternative is overnight stardom, but I can't give you a formula for that.

There is a long history in country music of songs celebrating drinking and lamenting drinking. Country songs for the most part have always been heavily rooted in reality. The first artists were the people next door. They would sing on their porch or in their living room or at a barn dance. They sang about what they knew, and a lot of that was drinking.