I don't associate much with anybody. I'm not big on all the teachings and groups and being a part of something, I guess.

The history of music is nothing more than the history of art-music or classical music, the music that was commissioned by aristocrats.

I just started playing music on the street and walking around with a fiddle, and I think that's kind of when I started being serious - or as serious as it's going to get.

I lived by a bay for a while, and I shucked oysters. Some packing things. You know, just whatever odd job you can find whenever you're moving around. I never really cared much for the franchise kind of work, so I'd try to find things that I considered to be a little more honorable.

Because I have something to say doesn't mean everyone has to take it too seriously or get too upset that it rubs them the wrong way.

You have a history of art-music that you equate with music. That's what I love about that term art-music. It separates itself from music-music, the music people have always made.

For a while, it was something to try to push at people, playing old murder ballads and being upset about everything I was seeing around me. But now I feel a lot more at peace with it.