Charley Pride

“The tastes of country music fans are not limited to the narrow range defined by consultants and programmers and record company moguls.”

“It isn't reasonable to expect that everyone in the world is a country music fan. Not yet, anyway.”

“What qualifies me to tell people how to act or what to think? I'm Charley Pride, country singer. Period.”

“Chet Atkins... is probably the best guitar player who ever lived.”

“The time I spent thinking about how I was better than somebody else or worrying about somebody else's attitude was time I could put to better use.”

“I've tried to help a lot of young artists get started.”

“There is an intimacy about the Opry Theater that gives an entertainer a special charge.”

“Redd Foxx was the same gruff old codger you saw on television.”

“I don't care what the religion is called; as far as I'm concerned, one God, the God I adhere to, is in charge of all of them.”

“For most entertainers, there is a single experience, one defining moment, when confidence replaces the self-doubt that most of us wrestle with.”

“Too many religious organizations are in the business of enforcing beliefs.”

“No one had ever told me that whites were supposed to sing one kind of music and blacks another - I sang what I liked in the only voice I had.”

“I was always a dreamer, in childhood especially. People thought I was a little strange.”

“I think there's enough room in country music for everybody.”

“A fan will grab you and hug you and will not let go. When that happens, you wish it could be that way all over the world.”

“There are worse things than being thought a Republican.”

“What we don't need in country music is divisiveness, public criticism of each other, and some arbitrary judgement of what belongs and what doesn't.”

“Performing is an experience, for me, that is as humbling as it is energizing.”

“Any entertainer who tells you that the adoration of fans is not a heady experience probably never had the experience.”

“Once your name becomes well known, politicians come courting.”