I've always seen myself as sort of this funky, eclectic artist.

I'm definitely not ready to move into something else. I'm having so much fun.

I've been playing swing chords for a long time.

My mother was really into big band. It was played in the house all the time.

I think somewhere in the back of my mind I've always wanted to make a whole swing album.

Country has been a wonderful outlet for me.

I love decorating my home. I'm a gardener too, so that's usually something I have to play catch up with.

For some reason, the concept of writing with swing chords was intimidating.

I made a Christmas album a couple of years ago and just put it out on my Web site. It kind of smacked of this flavor. All of the reviews said it was Western swing even when it was Christmas standards.

One of the things that I think is such a constant in country music is that the song is so much a story. I believe it is supposed to be based around a story.

I've always seen myself as sort of this funky, eclectic artist.

Aledo will always be home to me because I spent the first 27 years of my life there - it's such a special place - and because of the experiences I had there, I've become the person I am today.

My first solo was in church when I was five.

A small venue is so much more intimate and loose. You can actually be more spontaneous, I feel.

It's like Willie Nelson. You're an artist and you have different styles inside of you.

Meeting Chet was a life changing moment for me.

I think it's going to take my whole life to sort of get people to know what my perspective is.

The large venue gives me the thrill that comes from the power in numbers.

After so many changes, I realized I'd better cling to my own family and to what I've got right here.

I played in the percussion section 4th grade through high school - snare and timpani mostly.

I've written more songs for this record than I ever have in the past so I'm trying to give it a lot of special attention to be sure my ideas really get translated right.

After I found April Barrows, I felt I had found a soul mate. Her stuff is exactly what I was looking for.

I have been fortunate enough to record several singles and a whole album with Chet Atkins.

But it's just been recently that Nashville has started to feel like home.

I've always loved to sing.

I'm a real Suzy Homemaker.

Being a cover artist is not like being a real artist. That's just copying what someone else did.

The artist need not know very much; best of all let him work instinctively and paint as naturally as he breathes or walks.

What an artist learns matters little. What he himself discovers has a real worth for him, and gives him the necessary incitement to work.

Beauty, like truth, is relative to the time when one lives and to the individual who can grasp it. The expression of beauty is in direct ratio to the power of conception the artist has acquired.

I'm inspired by nature. Other artist's work is important for developing my perception.

There is only one position for an artist anywhere; and that is upright.

The difference between a bad artist and a good one is: the bad artist seems to copy a great deal; the good one really does.

To say that an artist sells out means that an artist is making a conscious choice to compromise his music, to to weaken his music for the sake of commercial gain.

What do you say when someone has truly inspired you? How do you express to an artist how deeply their work has affected you?

An original artist is unable to copy. So he has only to copy in order to be original.

When I say artist I mean the man who is building things - creating molding the earth - whether it be the plains of the west - or the iron ore of Penn. It's all a big game of construction - some with a brush - some with a shovel - some choose a pen.

You have to find what makes you stable in the storm. Then, no matter what's happening round you, no matter what the hype or the publicity, you can still manage to make leaps in your work as an artist.

The key to the mystery of a great artist is that for reasons unknown, he will give away his energies and his life just to make sure that one note follows another... and leaves us with the feeling that something is right in the world.

I've always felt that if one was going to take seriously this vocation as an artist, you have to get beyond that decorative facade.

Art is a private thing, the artist makes it for himself; a comprehensible work is the product of a journalist. We need works that are strong, straight, precise, and forever beyond understanding.

The most colorful section of a bookstore is the display of SF books, with art by people like Wayne Barlow, who is a terrific artist.

Arguably, no artist grows up: If he sheds the perceptions of childhood, he ceases being an artist.

Let not a man do what his sense of right bids him not to do, nor desire what it forbids him to desire. This is sufficient. The skillful artist will not alter his measures for the sake of a stupid workman.

I so much appreciate it when anybody tries to make something and tries to be an artist - I'm happy to see the work.

The artist is seen like a producer of commodities, like a factory that turns our refrigerators.

I've also been willing to share any help that I could give to any other artist.

An artist, under pain of oblivion, must have confidence in himself, and listen only to his real master: Nature.

What is it they want from the man that they didn't get from the work? What do they expect? What is there left when he's done with his work, what's any artist but the dregs of his work, the human shambles that follows it around?