Recently No Depression asked me to write about why Mickey Newbury resonates so strongly with me. I decided to write him a letter. Here’s an excerpt:

I was heading upstream, looking for the headwaters of a river the scope of which I barely comprehended. I traveled without a compass or a map. I went from point to point. I could sense that the tributaries of folk, country, bluegrass, and blues were all part of this same river, but I hadn’t yet begun to think of music as a natural, living thing; hadn’t understood that the same river that connected you to Stephen Foster connected me to you, too. At a time when I was struggling mightily to find my voice, I heard yours.

To read the letter in its entirety, visit No Depression.