Quotes from Bonnie Raitt

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

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.

I think everybody has a right to happiness and freedom and security and health care and education and guitar lessons.

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.

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.

No matter how you tell yourself It's what we all go through Those lines are pretty hard to take When they're staring back at you Oh, scared you'll run out of time When did the choices get so hard With so much more at stake Life gets mighty precious When there's less of it to waste

Religion is for those who are scared of hell, and spirituality is for those who have been there.

Let's give them something to talk about.

I do feel my loved ones that have passed on; I feel them looking over my shoulder... So yeah, that's pretty profound, when you're not expecting it, you didn't particularly believe in it and then it just sort of happens too often to ignore.

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 didn't have to be a pop singer with a certain look. When I started, there was really a revolution in natural artists with blues and folk artists crossing over; otherwise, I wouldn't have been able to get started.

The world I live in is benefiting from things like satellite radio. Jazz and blues fests are everywhere now, and Americana is going strong on college radio. What I'm hearing is an appreciation of real music.

Elvis might have compromised his musical style a bit towards the end, but that doesn't mean that artists from the rock n' roll/folk-roots culture - of which he was not really a part - shouldn't get better as they get older, like the great jazz or blues artists.

In 1967 I entered Harvard as a freshman, confident - in the way that only 17-year-olds are - that I could change the world. My major was African Studies, and my plan was to travel to Tanzania, where President Julius Nyerere was creating a government based on democracy and socialism.

People say, 'Gee, you don't really do political music.' Well, I sing a lot of songs about how men and women and lovers treat each other, and none of us want to be talked down to or belittled or ignored or disrespected... So I'm proud to be a feminist.

I think we have responsibilities to be active in the things we believe in, regardless of what our job is. At least in my lifetime, there has been a tremendous combining of activism and music, that came up in the era of Pete Seeger and the Weavers and Joan Baez and Bob Dylan and Peter Paul & Mary.

I'm glad I get singled out for my slide guitar-playing, which isn't that difficult to do. I didn't take guitar lessons, but I just love the way it sounds, almost like the human voice.

Finding great songs is the hard part of my gig - it's not as hard as songwriting, that's much more daunting - but I love playing other people's music.

I can't make you love me if you don't, You can't make your heart feel something it won't.

I can't make you love me, if you don't.

I'll close my eyes, so I won't see, all of the love that you don't feel for me.

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.