Songwriting is as much a craft as a talent.

A monkey was the President, though maybe not the first. And there was peace and harmony throughout the universe.

When I first got to Nashville, somebody said that [Kris Kristofferson and I] were the only two people who could describe Dolly Parton without using their hands.

I took up a sort of a hobby of just hanging around the local library. I'd pick out an author and I would read all their books.

It is so important for me to try, and having tried I look back on failure and success as if it were all the same.

I never fixed a story. I didn't make judgments, I let the listener make judgments. When I got to the end of the story, if it had a moral, I let the listener find it.

Make your melodies simple enough so that the average person can hum them.