Ronnie Dunn
Ronnie Dunn
Ronnie Gene Dunnis an American country music singer-songwriter and record executive. In 2011, Dunn began working as a solo artist following the breakup of Brooks & Dunn. He released his self-titled debut album for Arista Nashville on June 7, 2011, reaching the Top 10 with its lead-off single "Bleed Red". In 2013, after leaving Arista Nashville in 2012, Dunn founded Little Will-E Records. On April 8, 2014, Ronnie Dunn released his second solo album, Peace, Love, and Country Music through...
ProfessionCountry Singer
Date of Birth1 June 1953
CityColeman, TX
My own grandmother went to great lengths to make sure I knew simple things like how and when to open the door for a lady. And the best thing my mama taught me was to pray.
My preference is 3,000, maybe 5,000-seat venues.
Sometimes, I work a little more from emotion than I do from rational thought.
What a fine line there is between artistry and insanity. There's no formula for it, and I think a lot of people when they're around you - even those closest to you - when you're in that whirl of creativity and you're grabbing those things out of the air, there's no rational process.
I'm very much involved in art. I started buying art a few years ago and really like the work of T.C. Cannon, who is a native American artist. Then I was introduced to Soviet-era Russian impressionism and started collecting that, especially Gely Korzhev.
I went to 13 schools in 12 years. We moved all over the place. Music was the only thing that I could get behind... I wasn't that good at socializing. I'm still not.
I was freaking out when Brooks & Dunn were breaking up. I thought 'We play a ton of rodeos, and I thought this was such a cowboy deal, and I don't wear a hat. They might not think I'm a cowboy. That might sound ridiculous to a lot of people, but apparently, it meant something to me. I wound up with a cowboy tattoo from my elbow to my wrist.
I pay less attention to my hair then probably anybody that I know. I get out of the shower, I towel dry it. I, like, blow it off and then I just run my hands through it and away we go. It's just what it is.
I get around OK with a toolbox. As a kid, I picked up skills following my dad through the oil fields of Oklahoma and West Texas. My wife Janine is hard to impress, but she does think it's cool when I fix things around the house.
I feel like I am campaigning door to door. You just can't step out of a band like Brooks & Dunn and assume that it is just going to be business as usual. You have to work it. It does feel like a campaign where you would have Obama, Romney, or Newt beating the bushes right now. That's what I'm having to do.
I carry my own film guys with me now. People think that's a huge expense, but with technology like it is these days, it's not. You can film videos and everything with a Canon Mark II, and shoot a movie. They're doing it for next to nothing, by comparison. I can do ten videos for a project for the price of one mainstream video in the past.
When we look at cities across the country, Cincinnati, for example, where they have come under DOJ guidance with a consent decree, we see that, over time, there has been a transformation in the relationship between the police and the community, where now they have a partnership and true collaborative policing, co-policing, to make the community safer overall.
The music has to drive you. That's just it. You follow it. You follow the songs.
Country fans are the most loyal in the world.