Couldn’t be better. It’s better than I thought it would be.


I saw that you co-wrote with one of our Muscle Shoals friends, Dan Penn, how did you guys come to collaborate? It took me about one year to get up the nerve to call him. Like I am not worthy, from Wayne's World. Then we did get together and he came over the my house and we tried to write a song, but we sure did laugh. We got along and had a lot in common. We wrote a few songs and also laughed a lot too. We be- came good friends and I adore him. He is one of the best people I have met in my life and in the music business. That song is humorous and I just love it. "Going, Going, Gone." How old are you?


I am 48. You are definitely in the age range for that song. I have been doing that song live since I wrote it in1994-95. People will come over after a show and say they liked that song and want to know where to buy it. So it is great when you are a songwriter and can speak for other people, and they say that is exactly what I think. Then you have scored a coup in song writing. That song has really done that over the years. A lot of people really like it and un- derstand it. They say "you speak for me there." As a lyricist you can’t beat that.


That is true. I was thinking last night while looking over all your resume, that goes on forever, and saw one of the songs that you wrote, "This Dia- mond Ring." As a kid I remember that being one of the first records I had. I played it over and over. That was basi- cally my record collection as a little kid, that and some Beatles records. (Laughs) Cool.


Tell me about the Funky Faculty.


They are all professors at Berkeley College of Music in Boston which is one of the top music schools in the world. They are great guys and amazing musicians.I started teaching at Berkeley around 1997 and I had been there about 2 months. One of the guys called me and he said he hated to bother me, but his name was Bob Dozima and he taught at Berkeley. Every year they have a charity show for the school and they rent a hotel or a build- ing and take a lot of rooms and all different bands play in the rooms and then these big money people come and walk around from room to room and have a great time. He asked if I might want to play with them. He said, "We don’t have a keyboard player and we are in the Blues Room. I figured you might want to play but didn’t know anyone." I told him I would love to play with them. He said that we didn’t need to practice because it was just the blues. So by the third year I was in charge of the band. (Laughs) I added some horns and was singing some songs, and then we talked about rehearsing so we could go out and play in town. They are great guys and we have been around the world. We just get along great and it is fun when we get on the road. That is difficult to find, good musicians that are great people. If you can get away from the egos and stuff. I like to play with people my age. I get nervous when I see an old guy playing in a band of 20-year-olds. John Lee Hooker used to do that. I like it when people play with those their own age


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