A Song Is Like A Picture Of

Now Any Person Who Plays An Acoustic Guitar Standing Up On Stage With A Microphone Is A Folk Singer. Some Grandmother With A Baby In Her Arms Singing A 500-year-old Song, Well, She's Not A Folk Singer, She's Not On Stage With A Guitar And A Microphone. No, She's Just An Old Grandmother Singing An Old Song. The Term "folk Singer" Has Gotten Warped.

Songwriters Can’t Explain. You Get An Idea And You Don’t Know Where It’s Come From. And If You’re Lucky, You Have A Pencil Or Pen And Can Write It Down.

I Write A Song Because I Want To. I Think The Moment You Start Writing It To Make Money, You're Starting To Kill Yourself Artistically.

Songs Are Funny Things. They Can Slip Across Borders. Proliferate In Prisons. Penetrate Hard Shells. I Always Believed That The Right Song At The Right Moment Could Change History.

He [alan Lomax] Started Right Off Trying To Find People Who Could Introduce Folk Songs To City People. He Found A Young Actor Named Burl Ives And Said, "burl, You Know A Lot Of Great Country Songs Learned From Your Grandmother, Don't You Know People Would Love To Hear Them?" He Put On Radio Programs. He Persuaded Cbs To Dedicate "the School Of The Air" For One Year To American Folk Music. He'd Get Some Old Sailor To Sing An Old Sea Shanty With A Cracked Voice. Then He'd Get Me To Sing It With My Banjo.