Lee Ann Womack is from near where I grew up in East Texas, so I've always looked up to her. I sang a lot of Dolly Parton as a kid and a lot of traditional western swing, like Patsy Cline and Roy Rogers.
When I was really little, I listened to Dolly Parton, Loretta Lynn, Barbara Mandrel, Crystal Gayle, Kenny Rogers, Willie Nelson, and Patsy Cline.
When I was nine, I was singing western swing: Roy Rogers and Patsy Cline. It got me noticed because no one my age was doing it, but it made me feel inferior because none of my friends could relate to it.
I grew up listening to Patsy Cline. I was a huge Patsy Cline fan. I still am. Even though she's considered country, I think of her more as a blues singer. She's got a great blues voice, and she has such an amazing story, which I always loved.
You sounded like Dolly parton on helium." (After kristy lee cook of season 7 on american idol,sang her country rendition of the Beatles'"Eight Days A Week.)
When I first came out with Blue, everyone compared me to Patsy Cline, which is the biggest honor, 'cause I've always looked up to her.
I grew up listening to Dolly Parton and just loving her music.
I love Lee Ann Womack and John Prine. That's kind of my ideal cross point. If I can sing it like Lee Ann would and say it like John would, then I feel like I've gotten somewhere.
My dog Jake ran up to Dolly Parton, and he put his nose up her skirt. We were like, 'Oh my God, don't do that.' I didn't know Dolly, and she said, 'Watch out there little doggie, don't start something you can't finish.'
I grew up with the television product being old Western serials like Roy Rogers, and John Wayne and Gary Cooper, and many others were my favorites when I was a young person going to films.
I'm not really into alternative country - I'm into Patsy Cline, who lived down the street from where I lived, and old Dolly Parton records, Kitty Wells and that old stuff. I like country music. I also like Eric Church, who has a great new sound but also holds onto that old sound.
I grew up listening to a lot of player-piano music in my house and a lot of old Tin Pan Alley songs and American standards. My dad listened to a lot of traditional Irish music and I grew up doing musical theater. So most of the music I was exposed to as a kid was pre-rock n' roll.
As far as my creative urge is concerned, I do sit down and write my own music...I'll tell you a writer who I think is a genius: Ray Stevens. He comes up with some of the most fantastic novelty ideas. Dolly Parton also writes well. I like a lot of songs, a lot of writers.
A lot of my family is from Texas, stuff like that, so I was always in Texas, and when you grow up in Texas, around Texas, you want to go to the biggest Texas school, and UT was that.
I grew up as a Roy Rogers fan, of course.
Where I grew up, Bob Wills and his western swing was very popular. And western swing is not that far from jazz and blues.
I was the kid in the class who was looking for the angles to question things or make wise-ass remarks, not knowing enough to be afraid of being myself or showing intelligence. But I wasn't the only kid like that in my classes because of where I grew up. I'm really thankful I grew up in a town where there were a lot of other mutant kids. I'm from Boulder, Colorado, which went through a lot of dramatic changes when I was growing up.