“I feel I've had three careers in one, really. There was the 'Benny San...” — Chris Rea Quote

I feel I've had three careers in one, really. There was the 'Benny Santini' stuff; that came with a general sense of, 'Who the hell is he?' And then there was 'The Road To Hell' stuff, and now there's the blues stuff.

If the heads of all the music companies had known about music and about Chris Rea fans, they wouldn't have worried about 'Stony Road.' My regular fans have always known that side of me.

My heroes were gospel blues players like Blind Willie Johnson, Charley Patton, and Sister Rosetta Tharpe, not whoever was number one.

You do some crazy things when you're young.

I've always felt that if people just came to one of my gigs, all would be revealed.

If you look at Jack Benny, George Burns, or Don Rickles, they've all had long, successful marriages. So, I think there's something about laughter and the durability of a marriage.

People call me Benny. And as long as they put Benedict on my paycheck, I don't care.

I love getting on You Tube to look at the old comics. I am in my element seeing guys like Jack Benny and Phil Silvers give interviews.

I play trumpet. And I took all the music courses in college, so I can also play the string instruments, keyboard, the brass and woodwinds - but only well enough to teach them. If you put a violin in front of me, you wouldn't say, 'My God, that guy can play.' It'd probably sound more like Jack Benny.