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.

Music saved my life a few times because I could play the stuff rednecks loved. They thought I was great and they wondered why I didn't do that all the time.

I didn't have the self-promotion instinct, and I just didn't care about it. I sort of had a "beat" attitude.

If I wasn't so lazy, or if I had a roadie, I'd have a line of guitars on stage. I'd have a lap steel and a nylon string up there, but who wants to keep up with all that?

51 Martin [guitar] sounded pretty good as new guitar. Martin has several levels of guitars now, and this one is pretty good.

I've refined it since [ was living in Beaumont, Texas], but I was just obsessed with the guitar. I remember one day sitting in class and it just came to me how the neck worked. I was enlightened to the scales, and the runs. I just saw it and thought; now I understand it!

I was a young folk singer, or wanted to be. I really wanted to be a New England folk singer, but they never would accept me. I was always hard to categorize, and people wouldn't know what to make of it.