A Conversation with Marty Stuart (continued)

PM: So my old friend Kenny Vaughan is sitting there. You guys are just fantastic together. Your band has become a great home for him.

MS:  Well, I think we'd all played through all kind of musical scenarios just to get to each other, but it's the band of a lifetime. [The band, Marty Stuart and his Fabulous Superlatives, also features Brian Glenn on bass and Harry Stinson on drums, with all players contributing harmony vocals.]

PM: Do you have any favorite songwriters working today that come to mind?

MS:  The ones that I work with, or the ones I listen to?

PM: The ones you listen to, and who inspire you.

MS:  Well, Patty Griffin is awful good.

PM: Oh, yeah.

MS:  And just when I think I can write a song, I listen to a Guy Clark record or a Bob Dylan record, still, and there you go.

PM: Yeah, that'll keep you humble.

MS:  And that's the difference between song crafters and natural-born writers.

PM: In your schedule, do you find time for reading?

MS:  Yeah, I try.

PM: Read anything lately that turned you on?

MS:  Well, I like biographies. And the last two things I read were--Larry McMurtry wrote a book called Buffalo Bill, Annie Oakley, and the beginning of Superstardom in America--

PM: Wow!

MS: --which is a pretty good read.

PM: Oh, I'm going to get that.

MS:  And Eudora Welty is one of my favorite southern writers and photographers. There's a new biography out called Eudora, I guess, and so I bought that. And then I picked up a book in an airport today--I had to have because it said, God, the Biography.

[laughter]

MS:  So that's what I'm up to.

PM: Anything special on the turntable, as we used to say?

MS:  Me and Kenny Vaughan got in here with Harry Stinson and listened to the Ventures the other night. That was pretty fun.

PM: [laughs]

MS:  We listened to Out of Limits.

PM: Yeah, you got to go back to the source now and then.

MS:  Yeah.

PM: Are you what you call a spiritual person, Marty?

MS:  Oh, I try. I love the spirit, and I love spiritual matters. As I get older and further into my journey, it's what matters the most to me.

PM: And in what way do you incline, spiritually, toward the Christian way or--

MS:  Yeah, absolutely.

PM: Is there something musical or otherwise that you haven't tried yet that you'd like to attempt?

MS:  We don't have enough time to talk about it.

[laughter]

MS:  My friend Tom Allen, the great painter, he said, "You should always keep something in front of you that knows more about you than you know about it." So there's plenty of that.

PM: [laughs] Last one: Who would you love to sing a duet with that hasn't happened yet?

MS:  Connie Smith.

PM: That's my man. Marty, so nice of you to take the time with me today.

MS:  Oh, Frank, good to hear ya.

PM: All right, man. Hi to Kenny, and I hope to see you soon.

MS:  Will do, man.

[In addition to clips from Souls' Chapel, we thought we might include a selection from a greatest hits compilation on our Listen page, just to give a sense of some of Marty's other sounds for those readers who haven't yet had the pleasure. Instead we decided to go with an assortment from Marty's classic album The Pilgrim, check those out. And if you're looking for a couple of remarkable photographic experiences, tour the sites of two of the photographers whose shots are featured on these pages: James Minchin (whose recent images of the artist are seriously stunning) and Jim McGuire (maker of great portraits of many of the musicians creating the music that matters in Nashville over the past three decades).]

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