15 Thought-Provoking Quotes from Van Morrison

Van Morrison has made some of the most beloved songs of the last 50 years. His songs deliver a firm perspective on rural life, love, and pain. For even more bold statements from the folk hero, read 15 of his best quotes below.

[RELATED: 3 Songs You Didn’t Know Van Morrison Wrote for Other Artists]

1. “In order to win you must be prepared to lose sometime. And leave one or two cards showing.”

2. “Every performance is different. That’s the beauty of it.”

3. “The future is keeping you out of the present time.”

4. “I understood jazz, I understood how it worked. That’s what I apply to everything.”

5. “You take stuff from different places, and sometimes you stick a line in because it rhymes, not because it makes sense.”

6. “These days politics, religion, media seem to get all mixed up. Television became the new religion a long time back and the media has taken over.”

7. “If it’s what you do and you can do it, then you do it.”

8. “For a long time, I couldn’t actually deal with playing concerts; it was a totally alien concept to me, ’cause I was used to playing in clubs and dance halls.”

9. “I do see value in music criticism. Most of the criticism I have received over the years has been very good.”

10. “I educated myself. To me, school was boring.”

11. “You can’t stay the same. If you’re a musician and a singer, you have to change, that’s the way it works.”

12. “A famous person to themselves, they don’t get up in the morning and think, I’m famous. I’m not famous to me. Famous is a perception.”

13. “There’s always got to be a struggle. What else is there? That’s what life is made of. I don’t know anything else. If there is, tell me about it.”

14. “I don’t think nostalgia has to be negative.”

15. “I deliberately try not to cater for the commercial market, so I can’t see myself in competition, you know, with second or third-generation rock stars.”

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