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Top 20 Dave Van Ronk Quotes (2025 Update)

Dave Van Ronk Quote: “You can’t be afraid of failure and you can’t be afraid of success, because either one gets in the way of your work.”

1. “You can’t be afraid of failure and you can’t be afraid of success, because either one gets in the way of your work.”

— Dave Van Ronk

Dave Van Ronk Quote: “Sometimes you have to forget your principles and do what’s right.”

2. “Sometimes you have to forget your principles and do what’s right.”

— Dave Van Ronk

Dave Van Ronk Quote: “God has a way of telling you when to change your strings.”

3. “God has a way of telling you when to change your strings.”

— Dave Van Ronk

Dave Van Ronk Quote: “Blues is like a kielbasa, those long Polish sausages: you don’t sing a whole blues, you just cut off a section.”

4. “Blues is like a kielbasa, those long Polish sausages: you don’t sing a whole blues, you just cut off a section.”

— Dave Van Ronk

Dave Van Ronk Quote: “I think I have more in common with a carpenter than you might think. We’re putting things together.”

5. “I think I have more in common with a carpenter than you might think. We’re putting things together.”

— Dave Van Ronk

Dave Van Ronk Quote: “I’m a very, very stubborn man.”

6. “I’m a very, very stubborn man.”

— Dave Van Ronk

Dave Van Ronk Quote: “Honesty is the cruelest game of all, because not only can you hurt someone – and hurt them to the bone – you can feel self-righteous about it at the same time.”

7. “Honesty is the cruelest game of all, because not only can you hurt someone – and hurt them to the bone – you can feel self-righteous about it at the same time.”

— Dave Van Ronk

Dave Van Ronk Quote: “I’m an exhibitionist, I was an exhibitionist as a kid.”

8. “I’m an exhibitionist, I was an exhibitionist as a kid.”

— Dave Van Ronk

Dave Van Ronk Quote: “There is an apprenticeship system in jazz. You teach the young ones. So even if the musicians weren’t personally that likable, they felt an obligation to help the younger musicians.”

9. “There is an apprenticeship system in jazz. You teach the young ones. So even if the musicians weren’t personally that likable, they felt an obligation to help the younger musicians.”

— Dave Van Ronk

Dave Van Ronk Quote: “If you look at music, you see theme, variation, you see symmetry, asymmetry, you see structure, and these are related to skills in the real world.”

10. “If you look at music, you see theme, variation, you see symmetry, asymmetry, you see structure, and these are related to skills in the real world.”

— Dave Van Ronk

Dave Van Ronk Quote: “Ian and Sylvia, who, when you got right down to it, were essentially country and western singers. I just recorded his Four Strong Winds. It’s a wonderful song.”

11. “Ian and Sylvia, who, when you got right down to it, were essentially country and western singers. I just recorded his Four Strong Winds. It’s a wonderful song.”

— Dave Van Ronk

Dave Van Ronk Quote: “My uncle and my grandfather both worked in the Brooklyn Navy Yard.”

12. “My uncle and my grandfather both worked in the Brooklyn Navy Yard.”

— Dave Van Ronk

Dave Van Ronk Quote: “If you asked anybody in my family, they would have very stridently proclaimed themselves middle class. My mother and father were separated, so he doesn’t count.”

13. “If you asked anybody in my family, they would have very stridently proclaimed themselves middle class. My mother and father were separated, so he doesn’t count.”

— Dave Van Ronk

Dave Van Ronk Quote: “You can be a mighty sailor, wrestling with an alligator. Romping through the swamp.”

14. “You can be a mighty sailor, wrestling with an alligator. Romping through the swamp.”

— Dave Van Ronk

Dave Van Ronk Quote: “I cut myself off from the mainstream of jazz. It stood me in good stead later on, as a musician.”

15. “I cut myself off from the mainstream of jazz. It stood me in good stead later on, as a musician.”

— Dave Van Ronk

Dave Van Ronk Quote: “If there was ever any truth to the trickle-down theory, the only evidence of it I’ve ever seen was in that period of 1960 to 1965. All of sudden they were handing out major label recording contracts like they were coming in Cracker Jack boxes.”

16. “If there was ever any truth to the trickle-down theory, the only evidence of it I’ve ever seen was in that period of 1960 to 1965. All of sudden they were handing out major label recording contracts like they were coming in Cracker Jack boxes.”

— Dave Van Ronk

Dave Van Ronk Quote: “If I do a piece in my living room, if I practice it – and I have the tapes to prove this – it’s not going to be as good as doing the same piece in front of an audience.”

17. “If I do a piece in my living room, if I practice it – and I have the tapes to prove this – it’s not going to be as good as doing the same piece in front of an audience.”

— Dave Van Ronk

Dave Van Ronk Quote: “By the mid-70s, I wanted to get out of the business. I was tired anyway.”

18. “By the mid-70s, I wanted to get out of the business. I was tired anyway.”

— Dave Van Ronk

Dave Van Ronk Quote: “And then adds with a laugh, ‘but in retrospect I think he may have been more sophisticated than we were.’”

19. “And then adds with a laugh, ‘but in retrospect I think he may have been more sophisticated than we were.’”

— Dave Van Ronk

Dave Van Ronk Quote: “Most blues don’t have a beginning, middle, or end. You just cut a couple slices of blues.”

20. “Most blues don’t have a beginning, middle, or end. You just cut a couple slices of blues.”

— Dave Van Ronk

Dave Van Ronk Quote: “When you’re working in front of an audience, you have incentive to excel.”

21. “When you’re working in front of an audience, you have incentive to excel.”

— Dave Van Ronk

Dave Van Ronk Quote: “Most of what I listen to now is mainstream jazz from 1935 right up to and including early bebop and cool jazz.”

22. “Most of what I listen to now is mainstream jazz from 1935 right up to and including early bebop and cool jazz.”

— Dave Van Ronk

Dave Van Ronk Quote: “I don’t think I went a year or so without a record between 1959 and 1979, sometimes two.”

23. “I don’t think I went a year or so without a record between 1959 and 1979, sometimes two.”

— Dave Van Ronk

Dave Van Ronk Quote: “In the early 1970s. 1971, ’72. The rooms were closing down, record labels weren’t signing acoustic acts any more. Although they had been pretty much been getting out of that for some time before that.”

24. “In the early 1970s. 1971, ’72. The rooms were closing down, record labels weren’t signing acoustic acts any more. Although they had been pretty much been getting out of that for some time before that.”

— Dave Van Ronk

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