Quotes from Emmylou Harris

Country taught me how to sing, it put me on a path. But I was never going to be locked into a formula. I don't want to be considered a current country artist.

I didn't have any money. I had a sense of terrible loss. But what I also had was a fire in my belly. I wasn't going to go back to waiting tables. I felt I had to be better at fronting a band.

Well, I'm just very blessed that I still love my work and I can still work, I still have an audience and I love what I do.

Animals have a much better attitude to life and death than we do. They know when their time has come. We are the ones that suffer when they pass, but it's a healing kind of grief that enables us to deal with other griefs that are not so easy to grab hold of.

I think I can be pretty focused, but as I say, it was more wanting to be the good student, seeing myself as a good student, and also, my parents had expectations. They wouldn't have cared if I got a B or a C or even a D.

The world has lost a legend, and I have lost a friend. Johnny Cash was the rare soul who could be both.

I look at my voice and my abilities as a gift. I don't feel that I can even take any credit for it, but it's such a huge presence in my life. It is my life. It's my identity, it's everything. And it's given me a great deal of joy and a sense of purpose - I can't imagine my life without it.

As anyone who goes into dog-rescue knows, it is not a for-profit business, but the rewards are priceless for me.

I think musicians are always very generous in promoting anything good they hear. It's just kind of in our nature.

You meet a lot of people and have a lot of experiences, and they color you and stay with you - but I'm not the grieving widow. Life is much more complicated and interesting and full of zigs and zags than that.

There's a certain grace in accepting what your life is and embracing all the good things that have been - but there's still an expectation of good things to come. Not necessarily what you expected.

I'm just too busy living every day to really spend a lot of time thinking 'am I old?' I'm this age. I am in this moment and in this life.

When there are dogs and music, people have a good time.

You get to a certain point in your life where you get closer to the end of your life than the beginning, and it colors your life, in a way.

I really have shaken hands with where my voice is right now. I think it's got a little deeper; it's got some more grooves in it.

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 have just enough people paying attention that I have the freedom to be in charge. And I have a great record company - Nonesuch understands what I'm about.

My parents were not very happy. They were very worried about me pursuing a career that even if I had talent might not give me the happiness and the success that they - any parent hopes for their child.

Animals have a much better attitude to life and death than we do. They know when their time has come. We are the ones that suffer when they pass, but it's a healing kind of grief that enables us to deal with other griefs that are not so easy to grab hold of.

As anyone who goes into dog-rescue knows, it is not a for-profit business, but the rewards are priceless for me.

As citizens we have to be more thoughtful and more educated and more informed. I turn on the TV and I see these grown people screaming at each other, and I think, well, if we don't get our civility back, we're in trouble.

Country taught me how to sing, it put me on a path. But I was never going to be locked into a formula. I don't want to be considered a current country artist.

Pretty much all I say politically is I encourage people to register to vote.

The only time I ever appeared in the 'Enquirer' was for a piece about people who let their hair grow gray. I guess I'm not much of a wild child.