Katy Perry Quotes

That's one of the reasons I got into country music: because of the craft of that lyric and how much you could put into three minutes.

At 82, Nelson (who wrote the song "On the Road Again," among a thousand or more others) is the elder statesman of country music, a steadying and powerful voice in the industry and on environmental issues, and he's still on the road much of the year. The music keeps calling.

Laurie Lewis' songs combine passion and sheer craft in a way you don't hear very often. Whatever country music is supposed to be, she's at the center of it.

What songwriting does better than almost anything is empathy - it's incredibly empathetic. The reason people sat around in bars when they were bummed out and listened to country songs is because it made them feel better in the long run.

I like myself better when I'm writing regularly. ... I was influenced a lot by those around me-there was a lot of singing that went on in the cotton fields. ... I'm a country songwriter and we write cry-in-your-beer songs. That's what we do. Something that you can slow dance to...I never gave up on country music because I knew what I was doing was not that bad. ... Most of the stuff I've read about me has been true.

I think my music is definitely country but it's got a little bit of that rock flair about it. I always try to find the things that everyday people deal with in their everyday lives and situations in the songs that I sing.

I started writing songs after I heard Hank Williams.

So I learnt a few country western songs, I bought a chord book, and right away I started writing my own stuff, which nobody else did that, I don't know why.

Lets be clear, Dolly Parton is a rapper. Somewhere before all the country, I don't know what happens up there in the mountains when you're growing up, but she has been spitting rhymes for a very long time - 50 years I'd say.

I do think I'm country, but your definition of that word might be different from my definition. In my opinion, country music, the sound of country, has always evolved. But the one thing that has not changed is the story element. And I think country songs are truthful songs about life written by country people.

I listened to country music my whole life. I started writing music when I was a teenager. It all came out country.

I'm treating country music like it's a sport. I'm looking at where my competition is and realized I needed to work on my songwriting.

I just want to write good songs that people love, which is a tough thing to do.

I'm somebody who grew up listening to a lot of musical theater, so getting to finally write musical theater songs and songs that sound that way - the emphasis being on the storytelling, but the arrangements and the orchestrations can be really varied - I found that to be, actually, a really joyful discovery.

I'd hear a tune in my head and the words would come. And then, very suddenly it just stopped. It seemed too stilted to try and learn how to write a song, to go to round robins and to learn things from other people on how to write a song. So I just stopped and did other things.

What I hope is to really focus on being a songwriter. I'd love to write songs for other people; that's something I'd really like to start doing.

I remember people would talk about Country Music like it was this sexist, lame thing. Well, no, because Dolly Parton is writing songs and playing her guitar and producing. She's doing it all and she's got hits on the radio.

Songs are often written by people who are witnesses to history.

I respect country music because I feel like it's more about the talent and the songwriting.

I do craft songs, that this is designed. It's almost like the song was written to produce this desired effect. And it probably really works for somebody. It's maybe somebody's favorite tune, and it's really hard to come down on that, even if I feel a little embarrassed for it. Because some songs are written like a commercial, and that can be a little strange.

Finding out that Ray Charles sang country songs but it sounded as soulful as any rhythm and blues record that kind of opened up my horizons for what songwriting was and what singers I could listen to.

I wrote my first song when I was seven and that was kind of country. Now I'm just like 'No! Why did I play country?'

I feel like a lot of people look at pop music with a very formulaic perspective in numbers and patterns, but an outsider would think that the process is very natural. It is, but there are a lot of times where people treat it like a sport - there are tricks you can pull, different combinations that make something better. I don't really think I approach it that way, but I definitely have a love for the science that is pop song writing.

This is real, this is your life in a song...this is country music.

I didn't even know the industry of songwriting existed. I thought everybody sang songs and they were only singing the songs that they wrote. So after I found out about songwriting in college, I was like, "Okay, I want to do that."