Don McLean

I actually feel I'm in a much better place than I've ever been because I'm thankful people still love the songs that I've written, and they seem to like me. And they come to the shows in droves, and they get all excited, and I can still hit all the notes, and I don't look terrible.

I think longevity is more important than trying to make people realize you're around every second.

I've never done anything but what I wanted to do with my life. I don't think too many people can say that. I wrote the songs I wanted to write, for me. I had no idea that 'American Pie' would relate to anybody.

I mean, I've been given a terrific life by the audiences who stuck with me all over the world.

I developed this fantasy world. I found that that was much more fun and more interesting and exciting than real life was to me. Then, once I got the guitar going when I was a teenager, I set sail for the direction I've been in my whole life.

I'm glad that my music has helped other people as it's helped me. It makes me glad that I did what I did with my life.

Every thread of creation is held in position by still other strands of things living.

I got my first guitar when I was 16. I'd play for my family and friends, but taking that guitar out there into the wide, wide world wasn't something I ever thought about.

I don't relate to what's left of the music business. There doesn't seem to be any point to it anymore. The business that I grew up in and loved, we made records a different way - there were record companies, there were stores where you could buy albums.

I am what I do, and that's partly why I don't want to give up singing. But when I can't sing well, I will.

People ask me if I left the lyrics open to ambiguity. Of course I did. I wanted to make a whole series of complex statements. The lyrics had to do with the state of society at the time.

Herman Melville was supposed to be an accountant. Van Gogh was meant to be an art dealer. I was meant to take the train into New York and work for a bank. To be an artist, you have to say goodbye to your family.