I just wanted a style of music all my own.

Bluegrass has brought more people together and made more friends than any music in the world. You meet people at festivals and renew acquaintances year after year.

I was determined to carve out a music of my own. I didn't want to copy anybody.

I'm a farmer with a mandolin and a high tenor voice.

Practice every time you get a chance

I wanted to use some kind of name so people would know where I was from. So I took the name "bluegrass." There is not a prettier name in the whole world.

Bluegrass is wonderful music. I'm glad I originated it.

I just hope bluegrass entertainers take care of their music and take care of their fans. If you don't practice, the man next door who is practicing will beat you.

Country music belongs to America.

Practice every time you get a chance.

One of the hardest parts of my job is to connect Iraq to the war on terror.

As new dawns go, this one is depressingly like the old dawn.

You can tell a lot about a person by whether or not they're a transvestite.

We, too, need to be patient, especially when it comes to reaching new goals.

I don't even know what I was running for—I guess I just felt like it.

You've got to learn from your mistakes. And not do them again.

A good word is an easy obligation; but not to speak ill requires only our silence, which costs us nothing.

There won't be editors in the future with the Internet world, with citizen reporting. That doesn't scare me.

Most writers, I'm afraid, live very boring lives sitting in front of a screen. However, having said that: every writer puts a bit of themselves into the characters to bring them alive.

What the New Yorker calls home would seem like a couple of closets to most Americans, yet he manages not only to live there but also to grow trees and cockroaches right on the premises.