You got to get it while you can.

After they see me, when their mothers are feeding them all that cashmere sweater and girdle ----- [expletive deleted by the New York Times], maybe they'll have a second thought - that they can be themselves and win.

I started out to be a person on the street, just like everybody else. I didn't start out to be a singer. But I got sort of swept up in this singing thing, and after I got involved in it it got really important to me if I was good or not.

You better not compromise yourself, it's all you've got.

People, whether they know it or not, like their blues singers miserable. They like their blues singers to die afterwards.

I started singing rhythmically, and now I'm learning from Otis Redding to push a song instead of just sliding over it

When you hold somebody, you gotta hold them like it's the last minute of your life.