The music was thunder and joy. Lightning bolts of happiness and praise, foot-stomping, dance-shouting, good-feeling singing from the soul.

My mother always told me, even if a song has been done a thousand times, you can still bring something of your own to it. I'd like to think I did that.

Long as I was riding in a big Cadillac and dressed nice and had plenty of food, that's all I cared about.

The two things you can't fake are good food and good music

All the things I used to like - cookies, ice cream, gumbo - I don't like anymore.

What happens is, when I perform, I'm somewhere else. I go back in time and get in touch with who I really am. I forget my troubles, my worries.

At last my love has come along. My lonely days are over and life is like a song.

I wanna show that gospel, country, blues, rhythm and blues, jazz, rock 'n' roll are all just really one thing. Those are the American music and that is the American culture.

A lot of people think the blues is depressing but that's not the blues I'm singing. When I'm singing blues, I singing life. People can't stand to listen to the blues, they've got to be phonies.

When I sing for myself, I probably sing for anyone who has any kind of hurt, any kind of bad feelings, good feelings, ups and downs, highs and lows, that kind of thing.

I want a Sunday kind of love A love to last past Saturday night And I’d like to know it’s more than love at first sight

Want to have a short phone call with someone? Call them at 11:55 a.m., right before lunch. They'll talk fast. You may think you are interesting, but you are not more interesting than lunch.

Bringing the essence of life in form of experience is the most crucial element in the development of human mind.

A thing of beauty is a joy forever:Its loveliness increases

We must start understanding other cultures, such as the Aboriginal culture. They have a harmony with the Earth and from that harmony has grown a certain spirituality.

The oil lobby, perhaps the most powerful lobby on earth, is almost matched by hospital owners and doctors.

I am always reading or thinking about reading.

Highly reliable components are not necessarily safe. .

The same stream of life that runs through the world runs through my veins night and day.

Nobody's reasonable when they're in love. That's the whole point of it.