There'll come a writing phase where you have to defend the time, unplug the phone and put in the hours to get it done.
From James Taylor
When you write a song, it may come from a personal space, but it very seldom actually represents you. It comes out of a sort of mood of melancholy, somehow. It's almost theatrical.
Songwriting is too mysterious and uncontrolled a process for me to direct it towards any one thing.
It's a real wrenching thing to go from being a private person to being a public person, especially when you're being autobiographical. But it's what everyone wants - to get everyone's attention, to have your music make a living for you, to be validated in that way.
What I've always done as an entertainer is try to come up with things that people will find interesting, or compelling, or humorous.
The best thing is when you hear somebody take your song and make something great of it.
I enjoy selling my music. I don't enjoy selling myself.
I have a studio in a barn at home - we rehearse there, we film there and we record there. It's fun to hang out with my guys and see what comes out next.
I sometimes wonder how many of these lifetime achievement awards you can accept before you have to do the decent thing and die.
One of my earliest memories was me singing 'Oh, What A Beautiful Mornin' at the top of my voice when I was seven. I got totally carried away. My grandmother, Sarah, was in the next room. I didn't even realise she was there. I was terribly embarrassed.
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