Here are a few lessons from modern American music. First, he not busy being born is busy dying. (Bob Dylan) Second, you can’t hang a man for killing a woman who is trying to steal his horse. (Willie Nelson) And, third, you come to see what you want to see; you come to see, but you never come to know. (Kinky Friedman) --Dan Helpern
Songwriting is Hell on Earth. If it isn’t, then you’re doing it wrong. –Jimmy Webb
Did you ever stop and think that with any question in life, you could respond with a line or a name of a Beatles’ song? --Rusty Goldman
He who lives by the song, dies by the road. –Roger Miller
(when asked, “How come most of your songs are sad songs?”) Well, you know, I don’t think they’re all that sad. I have a few that are just—that aren’t sad. They’re hopeless. –Townes Van Zandt
Old songs are more than tunes. They are little houses in which our hearts once lived. –Ben Hecht
As I walked out of the studio that night, I said to myself, “If that’s not a hit, I don’t know my butt from a biscuit.” --Dolly Parton
