Like all soul singers, I grew up singing in church but sometimes I would leave early and sit in the car listening to gospel band, The Blind Boys of Alabama. Hearing their lead singer Clarence made me connect the idea of church and show business and see how I could make a career singing music that stirred the soul.
With 'Selma,' I grew up in Alabama, 45 minutes away from Selma. I have gone to that commemorative march many times with my parents.
I grew up really close to Alabama, about 10 minutes from the Alabama line. We'd make trips to Alabama, and I feel at home there.
My father joined our party because the Democrats in Jim Crow Alabama of 1952 would not register him to vote. The Republicans did.
I'm involved with Kid One Transport and Studio by the Tracks in Alabama. Kid One literally transports kids to better health by giving them transportation they may need to get medical care. Studio by the Tracks is an art outlet for mentally challenged children.
In the state of Alabama we have a significant number of illegal aliens that are leaving our state as occurred in Arizona after they got tough on illegal aliens.
Alabama seniors all across the Third Congressional District continue facing high drug costs.
My parents were both born in Birmingham, Alabama, and come from large Catholic families with lots of Michaels, Marks, and Patricks, so they wanted to choose two names that I don't think you could find anywhere else in the family tree: Haley and Joel.
When I was growing up in rural Alabama, it was impossible for me to register to vote. I didn't become a registered voter until I moved to Tennessee, to Nashville, as a student.
When I moved to Chicago, I was coming from a school that didn't have any arts in Alabama. I essentially came from a town where the arts didn't exist and the desire for education didn't exist and wasn't valued.
I was born in Alabama and my first live music experiences were in church. Every Sunday we watched regional gospel groups on television singing their hearts out.
I just grew up a poor black kid in Alabama with a single mom and two brothers.
I shall be well enough when I get to Kentucky or Alabama. The tonic I need is the tonic of opposition. That always sets me on my feet.
If I can reach the guy in Alabama that hunts, and he hears that song, and he sees me - like, he's comfortable with me, my image as a person, as an artist - he's willing to sit down and give that song a chance.
My girlfriend and I rented a nice house on the river and I was there for about two and a half months, and we were just out of Alabama. I hardly got to see Alabama.
Beginning in June, Alabama seniors previously without prescription drug coverage should begin to see savings of between 10 and 25 percent on their medications.
I grew up very poor in rural Alabama.
Hollywood is run by people who sit up in their executive office, who are not connected to Mississippi, Alabama, Chicago, South Carolina. They know nothing about that, they don't go to church, and they make their decisions about what they think is right.
My grandmother was born in 1900, and she would regale me with tales I call 'Little House on the Prairie' tales, but they were tales of segregated and racist America growing up in Alabama and Mississippi, where she came from.
I went to the Alabama public schools at a time when my English teachers, all but one of whom was a woman, taught nothing but the classics. They revered the great British and American writers.
The worst gig story I have is from a club in Alabama that I think is still up and running, so I won't name the name of the club. We got hired in there to play, and the owner was pretty annoying. He kept coming up to me during the show and asking me to play 'Purple Rain.'
The great thing that I appreciate - the fact that my godfather, William 'Sticky' Jackson, was a Tuskegee Airman because my father was first born in Ozark, Alabama. The sacrifices and the commitment of those men made it possible for myself and many others.
They would come down in Mississippi, they hired me as a talent scout. And I would go all over Mississippi, Alabama, Texas, and find out different artists for them.
We're given the springboard of the text, a plane ticket, told to report to Alabama, and there's a group of people all ready to make a film and it's a marvelous life.
My mother was from Mississippi, or is from 'Mississippi;' my father was from Alabama. He speaks about conditions in Mississippi and Alabama. They were really the poster children for the bad public laws that segregated, according to race, in our country.
It is my belief CAFTA will be beneficial for Alabama and the United States as a whole.
Captain Richard Phillips of the good ship Maersk Alabama - and Sully Sullenberger splashing down his crippled airliner in the Hudson River - broke through the poisonous smog of economic depression and Wall Street skullduggery with a reminder that pure individual heroism is a daily occurrence if we know where to look for it.
I had an art teacher who's the reason I got there in high school who encouraged me to go to Alabama. That's where she had gone and kept raving over their art department.
Tuscaloosa, Alabama - I love you.
I think people can learn from my experience - you know, any young people who are under pressure, whether you work on Wall Street or you work in a factory in Alabama, and young journalists.
The Second Amendment reflects the brilliance of our founders, who knew that no right is guaranteed unless we are willing to fight for it, and I remain committed to fighting for the rights of lawful gun owners as the senator for Alabama.
The repeal of racist language in the Constitution of Alabama was and still is a necessary step in the state's ability to progress.
The Broadcast Decency Enforcement Act of 2004 helps address the continuing degradation on the broadcast airwaves and helps send a clear message to the broadcast industry that Alabama families, like the rest of American families, have had enough.
We have built a genuine level of enthusiasm and goodwill with people throughout this district. People are really excited about the possibilities this election holds, not just for this district, but because of the message Alabama sent to the rest of the country.
You can't take a kid from north Alabama and growing up in church - some of that is just gonna seep out.
I pledge to the people of Alabama to continue the same level of leadership as Jeff Sessions in consistently fighting to protect and advance the conservative values we all care about.