“Everything that came later… the roots are all there in the first album.”

I may not believe in myself, but I believe in what I’m doing.

I’m very fortunate because I love what I’m doing.

You can’t just find yourself doing something and not happy doing it.

I’ve never regretted anything I’ve ever done.

I always thought the good thing about the guitar was that they didn’t teach it in school.

I will still carry on changing all the time.

You don’t find geniuses in street musicians, but that doesn’t mean to say you can’t be really good.

A lot of people can’t be on their own. They get frightened. Isolation doesn’t bother me at all. It gives me a sense of security.

I always felt if we were going in to do an album, there should already be a lot of structure already made up so we could get on with that and see what else happened.

I know where I’m going musically. I can see my pattern and I’m going much slower than I thought I’d be going.

I don’t like being stuck in one situation, day to day.

Live Aid did feel like one hour’s rehearsal after several years, but to be part of Live Aid was wonderful. It reall was.

When you hear the melodic structures of what classical musicians put together and you compare it to that of a rock & roll record, there’s a hell of a long way rock & roll has to go.

I like change and I like contrast.

I’m still terrified of flying. I really have to get drunk to fly. I’ve found that I’ve developed fears I never had before… fears of heights, claustrophobia only in cities, though, never in the country.

I’m not a guitarist as far as a technician goes, I just pick it up and play it. Technique doesn’t come into it.

I’ve always wanted to make a bluegrass album.

My mother kept asking me, “When are you going to do a gospel album?” And I’ve always wanted to do a gospel album.

I’m free to do what I please, I’m probably not going to do albums. Just because I think releasing tracks as singles is a better way for me to stay topical.

People say releasing an album is like giving birth, but it’s more like having a gallbladder operation.

I’ve always known that if I recorded an album, it would come out, and people would enjoy it!

One of the hardest things I’ve had to deal with in my career is keeping my material topical even though I only release albums every three or four years.

I like to think that I’ve gotten better at what I do. I spend more time and pay more attention to detail album after album. But pretty much it’s stayed the same.

Probably 90 percent of my albums have polka medleys.