Ricky Skaggs Quotes

I always loved bluegrass, but there was so much I didn't know about American country music in respect to the origins of this country. It was interesting to see the evolution of it.

I don't think it's changed that much when you go on the principle if Garth introduced more rock into country music, then Florida Georgia Line's gonna introduce more dance and more beat-driven stuff into country music. That's just how it's gonna go. So whatever influences you as a kid, you're gonna put in your music.

I'm excited to be part of a movement that's progressing country music. There's always gonna be people saying, 'It ain't country anymore,' but I don't get into that whole deal.

I started rocking and rolling when Guns N' Roses came out. It wasn't until Garth Brooks came around that I really got back to country. He made it fun again. To me, in country music, the rigor mortis was setting in and it just wasn't fun anymore. Garth brought everyone back over to country and made it cool again.

I've been devoted to Alison Krauss for many, many years.

There's been a shift: Country music is popular music now. Every other genre wants to come over to our land.

I think every once in a while country has lost its way, but found its way back. It's always going to drift away from the traditional side, but then find a way to return. There's room for all kinds of influences be it pop, blues, gospel or whatever. But I will always say that I think we need more traditional country music coming down the pike.

I was a folk singer who became totally over the edge with country music. I found my voice and style working with Gram Parsons. I learned how to listen to George Jones records and the Louvin Brothers.

I've seen country music go uptown, like we say, and I'm proud I was there when it happened.

Guys like me and Ray Charles, when we was coming up through our days, country music and soul music was just a very thin line between the two.

I try to be a good representative for country music. But as a country artist, it's important to move the needle and make a difference beyond your core audience. But you can't ever strategically try to accomplish that; then things get weird.

I think the great country songs mixed with some of that bluegrass instrumentation - and surrounding all that with a little bit of a rock vibe and energy - is the kind of music I make.

In the range of music that we play - roughly 300 years' worth-there really are more similarities than differences.

Within the songwriting community, there are these unwritten rules for the way that a song should be written in country music, and I think that those rules are constantly being broken over the years, and the molds change and the process is evolving.

It doesn't matter if you stick the name 'bluegrass' on it. I think people call things bluegrass that I wouldn't necessarily call bluegrass, but what they're calling country music today I'm not sure that I would call country music. But I love music and I try to encourage people.

A lot of great bluegrass comes out of Kentucky. There's a lot of great music, like the Judds, Billy Ray Cyrus, Ricky Skaggs, and Keith Whitley. There's a lot of bluegrass intertwined with country music.

Early Bluegrass is my favorite kind of music, not to many people know that.

I think the average country music fan grew up the same exact way that all the artists did, listening to hip-hop and country and R&B and pop and whatever it may be.

The other guys in Hootie were into rock. I brought the country influence.

I grew up on a farm in eastern Tennessee with a very southern lifestyle, so my roots are super country and southern, but my first concert was Britney Spears. I think that you can hear both of those influences in my music.

Truth of the matter is, jazz is American music. And that doesn't mean bebop. Jazz is really about improvising. All the music that's been created in America has been pretty much improvised... Whether it's hillbilly or rock n' roll for blues, it's basically jazz music... It's basically about another way of hearing what comes out of America.

We were so influenced not only by country music but by the rock bands of the '80s. Our focus was to bring in something different. Country music already had a George Strait and Alabama. We wanted to put some pop music in our show.

I was in Screaming Trees - I wasn't really interested in playing quiet music in a live setting. But I would get asked quite often to do a show or open for somebody, and I always said no. Finally, I was asked if I would open for Johnny Cash, and Johnny Cash was one of my dad's favorite heroes. So that's why I started doing solo shows.

I believe in the future of country music, but a future without roots is like a kite with no string.

I grew up in Mountain Pine, Arkansas. You get no more country than where I grew up. But I also grew up in the Napster / iTunes / Spotify/ iHeart Radio era, and so I see that everything is influenced by everything else, and that's what country music is now.