Rory Block Quotes

When I was very young my mother sang to me at bedtime and my dad would often play the banjo or fiddle in the evening. I knew music was important and central to everything, most particularly it had a powerful healing value and created a sense of peace and security. This stood out to me as I always felt the world was precarious and dangerous, and music supplied those moments of real peace and safety.
Rory Block

The first big music scene started in Washington Square Park somewhere in the sixties. In those days everyone would get together and jam. It was a really fantastic period of time with an incredible amount of musical energy everywhere. That's the period of time when Bob Dylan, Joan Baez, Pete Seeger, and so many other great artists were getting established. I came into my dad's store one day and saw a pale, artistic looking man sitting there with a small cap and long fingernails holding a guitar. After he left my dad told me he was a musician and a poet, but that he didn't want any part of the pressures of the business and just wanted to be true to his art and his poetry. It was Bob Dylan. Later my dad told me he had seen a great singer in a small club in the Village who's voice had the power to make you weep. He said, "You watch, this young woman is going to become very famous." It was Joan Baez.
Rory Block

There are many influences in my music, not only blues. R&B, Motown, gospel, old timey, jazz, even classical are all part of what I do. I started with classical, then country, then blues, and after that I started listening heavily to Motown and gospel. My earliest efforts as a songwriter were soul. Aretha Franklin, Curtis Mayfield, Wilson Pickett, Gladys Knight, James Brown, Otis Redding, Marvin Gaye and Fontella Bass are just a few of the names that come to mind as the God's of soul and Motown.
Rory Block