My most powerful memory was hearing Earl Scruggs on 'The Beverly Hillbillies' as a 5 or 6 year old. That sound just blew me away, shook my head up..

I first heard the banjo on the Beverly Hillbillies, and from then on I was banjo-conscious. But I didn't actually get one until my grandfather gave m….

There are a lot of chapters to the banjo's history. Part of it are the roots in Africa, where it's a more primitive instrument. Then it comes to the ….

I doubt anybody would have pushed me [on the music]. When I was at Sony nobody ever gave me any creative suggestions on the music..

Sometimes you can fix something that went wrong with what you do next and make it better than it would have been if it hadn't gone wrong, as an impro….

I learned that I'm so busy with what I'm doing, so focused on what I'm doing, that I miss a lot of opportunities for interacting with people..

I think it is very ironic that most people think that the banjo is a southern white instrument. It came from Africa and even for the first years that….

I think I'm getting better at being verbal. I used to have a lot of problems with it. I had my own little demons that I was fighting, and I used the ….

And then Earl Scruggs comes along and transforms the banjo into a virtuosic modern instrument. For the first time, the Southern banjo style becomes t….

I always try to work with people who are better than me, so I can learn more..

I was a big fan of a writer named Jack Vance, a science fiction writer. He always wrote about these guys who were either going down a river in a stra….

I don't know enough about hip-hop, though I've heard some great hip-hop. I just did a thing with Qwest Love - we did a performance together in Memphi….

I think the musical evolution I've gone through has come from all the work with the material..

Being from New York, I wonder why am I inspired by bluegrass and Earl Scruggs? But when I look at the whole history of the banjo, I feel really good ….

There is a tendency to want to isolate a little bit, from people that might look at me from a fan position, because it's hard to be a real person aro….

I think the Flecktones are a mixture of acoustic and electronic music with a lot of roots in folk and bluegrass as well as funk and jazz..

There's a lot of hip-hop that would be great with a banjo in it. It would just groove like crazy, and I hope I get to be one of the guys who does tha….

It doesn't have to be happy music to be inspiring..

Everybody should have a documentary made about themselves. It's amazing what you see and what you learn..

When I play my own music, or when I play new music, there's much more stress and intensity of thinking about how I'm going to make it work!.