My wife, as proud as she was of me, hated show business for good reasons. There was something about the spouse always being pushed out of the way, shoved aside. She wanted to get away from it.

There are tribes all over the world who sing and dance every day as part of their lives. And we oughta do that.

I worked nightclubs all through my 20s, and I was a teetotaler.

I'm really in retirement. My career is over. I'm just playing now and having a great time. I like to keep busy, and I'm doing what's fun for me.

I went public with the alcoholism, very early on... the early '70s. Mercedes McCambridge, the actress, I think was the first recognizable person that went before Congress and talked about it, and I thought that was a good idea, to take some of the stigma away from it and say "Normal, average people can fall prey to it." So it's been public for me. I did a movie about an alcoholic. And today, you're nobody unless you've been to rehab. It seems like everybody has some kind of an addiction.

I think it's being thrown at the wolves, we call it in our business.

I sing all day. And it's good for you. Good for your vocal cords.