Ringo Starr may not have much of a voice, but when he sang a song on a Beatle album, it had its own special charm.

James Taylor may be an all-American boy but he isn't Horatio Alger, and the lionizing of many rock stars by the rock press has as much to do with old fashioned rags-to-riches stories as does the straight culture's deification of its idols.

It didn't matter that Charlie Chaplin may not have been a great director or a great anything else. He made great movies.

I just thought, that's what you did -- you sang in a voice that was appropriate for the song. You wrote music that was exciting to you and incorporated any style you liked. That shaped me as a musician and has been the key to my longevity. I accepted that music as the Bible.

James Taylor is the kind of person I always thought the word 'folksinger' referred to. He writes and sings songs that are reflections of his own life, and performs in them in his own style. All of his performances are marked by an eloquent simplicity.

Since her landmark 'Tapestry,' Carole King has both oversimplified and over elaborated that masterful album's style until her music has become something more overtly but less effectively personal.