The principle is competing against yourself.

In medieval times, artists had patrons that supported them and this is a similar thing, ... We're basically saying, 'Wouldn't you like to be a part of this'

I heard black people sing and the emotion was overwhelming to me. The power of that with all the built in sorrow and joy was just overwhelming to me as a little kid. It was the real deal.

I saw all that [white trash] growing up in Alabama and Georgia. I had a group of country cousins and we'd go visit them when I was a kid. They lived on a red dirt Georgia back road, in a shack, with twelve kids. Farmers. No electricity, they had a well on their back porch, but they had nothing, yet they were the happiest, freest people I'd ever met. I loved to visit them. Great sense of humor, and they kept up with all the latest music, country, rockabilly, that stuff. Great food they grew in the fields and canned. Happy people.

I really wanted a guitar. As A little boy I used to tell people I was going to be a musician. They would humor me, and I'd make up thirty minute songs and drive them nuts.

I had admired Waylon [ Jennings], but I never expected to meet him and get to know him. When I finally moved to Nashville years later, one night I went to a Harlan Howard Guitar Pull thing, and there was Waylon. He started talking about how much he loved my work and how great I was, and I couldn't even get a word in.

When you're an elite athlete, it's a very special moment in time and you don't want it to end.