As a child, I went to peace and ERA marches on the back of my mom and grandmother. Through them I learned that I wanted to find a way to make the world a more kind, compassionate place.

I've noticed that the more I open up, the more I learn.

When I first started playing the banjo and miraculously fell into a record deal in Nashville, TN, there was a period when I didn't go to China. It hurt. Like a pain in my gut... that pain you feel when you know it's time to connect with your parents or your God or your child or your past or your future... and you don't do it.

I do see music as complete refuge. It's a universal home, complete common ground between everyone; it comes from a place that has no nation and no boundaries around it.

I would still describe China as a vast, invigorating puzzle that will never make sense to my western upbringing.

I feel like my kind of music is a big pot of different spices. It's a soup with all kinds of ingredients in it.