I think women like to laugh, to have doors opened for them, to have a man walk behind them when they're going up steps, and in front of them when they're going down steps. As chauvinistic as that may sound, it's in my bones.

I love my wife and I know she loves me. We're best friends. We're just lucky to have found each other. It takes a lot of work but I just feel very blessed that I found the right person. It's a very fortunate situation and not everyone has that.

New Orleans is my essence, my soul, my muse...

My dad was the district attorney of New Orleans for about 30 years. And when he opened his campaign headquarters back in the early '70s, when I was 5 years old, my mother wanted me to play the national anthem. And they got an upright piano on the back of a flatbed truck and I played it.

I don’t really get shaken very much. People could heckle me, a spotlight could go out, I could forget a lyric... I’m not operating on somebody’s brain, you know what I mean? So I just think it’s all funny.

The whole 'American Idol' way of looking at things is the antithesis of what I grew up with. There are a whole lot of kids wanting to be famous now, whereas if I'd even mentioned that word to one of my teachers, I would have got into a whole load of trouble.

I think women like to laugh, to have doors opened for them, to have a man walk behind them when they're going up steps, and in front of them when they're going down steps. As chauvinistic as that may sound, it's in my bones.