Vince Gill – HuffPost 11.7.11

Mike Ragogna: What advice do you have for new artists?

Vince Gill: Oh, gosh. Just remember why you wanted to do this in the first place. You gotta be extremely patient and you gotta have really thick skin, and understand that not everybody’s going to love it. There’ll be times that are the worst in your life and times that are the greatest in your life. I’ve always tried to ignore my success and ignore my failure, and just keep on an even keel and realize that I can’t control any of the results. It’s like the weather. You can’t control the weather, so you can’t get uptight about it. It’s the same thing with your career. You make a record and whether they buy it or they don’t, none of the notes change, if you sell a hundred million or a hundred.

MR: Is that what happened with you?

VG: Yeah, I think so. I think the results have not dictated to me whether I was successful or not. When I quit Pure Prairie League and went to work for Rodney, people said, “Why’d you do that? You were the front man of a big rock band,” and I said, “Well, the musicianship and caliber of songs and all of that stuff that I went to was better. To me, it was a step up.” Any time I got to be in an environment that I think made me better, then I felt that was success.