Religion is for people who are scared to go to hell. Spirituality is for people who have already been there.

I've been lucky enough that I can gather all sorts of experiences and find inspiration by traveling around and by spending time with people I admire.

I think people must wonder how a white girl like me became a blues guitarist. The truth is, I never intended to do this for a living.

I would rather feel things in extreme than not at all.

I never saw music in terms of men and women or black and white. There was just cool and uncool.

I've watched my peers get better with age and hoped that would happen with me.

Playing guitar was one of my childhood hobbies, and I had played a little at school and at camp. My parents would drag me out to perform for my family, like all parents do, but it was a hobby - nothing more.

I think my fans will follow me into our combined old age. Real musicians and real fans stay together for a long, long time.

There's nothing like living a long time to create a depth and soulfulness in your music.

I don't think there's ever been any music quite like what we came up with.

I grew up in Los Angeles in a Quaker family, and for me being Quaker was a political calling rather than a religious one.

I have a really full life, both within music and outside it.

I like to think I get better with age, but maybe absence makes the heart grow fonder.

I made my first album, and I guess it wasn't a fluke, because now I'm on my 16th.

It is still a surprise when people tell me that I've had an influence on them, particularly when it's someone I really respect.

I just play the music that I love with musicians that I respect, and fortunately, I'm in a position where people are willing to play with me, and perhaps I can do something to help them.

I'm certain that it was an incredible gift for me to not only be friends with some of the greatest blues people who've ever lived, but to learn how they played, how they sang, how they lived their lives, ran their marriages, and talked to their kids.

Sometimes I'm more true when I'm up onstage than I'm able to be in my regular life. It's not as exciting to be at home, but I've got to learn how to make that work, and then I will be an ordinary woman.

The consolidation of the music business has made it difficult to encourage styles like the blues, all of which deserve to be celebrated as part of our most treasured national resources.

There were so many great music and political scenes going on in the late '60s in Cambridge. The ratio of guys to girls at Harvard was four to one, so all of those things were playing in my mind.