Photography by Katie Basile
Brooklyn based singer-songwriter Lara Ewen on out-of-tune pianos, The Ramones, her latest album The Wishing Stone Songs, and how music is a lot like love; you need someone else in the room to make it real. AHC: What has this journey in music, so far, been like for you, the highs and the lows, and what life lessons do you feel you've picked up along the way? Lara: I don’t think of music as a journey. It’s not something that moves along, and has a beginning and a middle and an end. It’s just always been there, and I expect it always will be. I hope so, anyway. The highs and lows that have come from music are so intertwined with the highs and lows of my life that they’re impossible to separate. That’s why my songs are quasi-autobiographical. The music is about life. If you want to know what I’ve learned — which is not a lot, to be honest — the best way to do that is to listen to my songs. AHC: What first drew you to music and what was your early musical environment like growing up? Were there pivotal songs for you then that just floored you the moment you heard them? Lara: Growing up in Jamaica, Queens, we had a really old, shitty, out-of-tune piano in the living room. My folks never had the thing tuned. I don’t know why we even had it, but I liked to bang on it. My mom listened to a lot of country music, and we also listened to a lot of singers from the ’40s and ’50s, like Edith Piaf, Ella Fitzgerald, Nat King Cole. And there was a radio station, 1050 WHN, and they played all country music when they weren’t playing Mets games. So listened to that, and then also to WLIR, which played a lot of alternative stuff: Joy Division, Bauhaus, Blondie, that kind of thing. And I remember the first time I heard The Ramones. They blew my mind. There was a lot of hip hop in my neighborhood, and so that’s also part of the fabric of music for me. Still, when I started writing my own songs, they always came out country-sounding. I don’t know why. AHC: Do you remember the first song that you ever wrote or played? Or that first moment when you picked up a pen and realized that you could create whole worlds just by putting it to paper? Lara: I’ve been writing songs for as long as I can remember. I was writing songs when I was 5 years old, maybe younger. I used to make my brother put on shows with me in the living room, with me playing the piano and both of us singing. I also wrote a lot of poetry, which I am pleased to say has mostly been lost to the mists of time. AHC: Which musicians have you learned the most from? Or writers, artists, filmmakers, teachers/mentors etc? Lara: By far, I’ve learned the most from the people in the various communities I’ve been lucky enough to be a part of. I was in Boston in the mid-1980s and early 1990s, and that was certainly a big deal for me. That’s where I learned to play guitar, and that’s where I met some of the people who really helped me see that it was totally possible for me to get up on a stage and play songs in front of actual people, and not just, you know, in a living room for my grandma. And now in New York, the community here is just incredible. I know so many talented people, and I am lucky enough to be friends with some amazing musicians. If I start listing everyone, I’ll forget someone. But at this exact instant, the musicians I’m most hung up on are Jessi Robertson, who has a voice that will change your life; Niall Connolly, who is able to make me both weep and laugh within the same set, and sometimes even within the same song; Chris Michael, who released the best album you’ll ever hear last year; Queen Esther, who elevates the whole idea of what Americana is; Richard McGraw, who is almost indescribable, but kind of sounds like if Leonard Cohen were a lunatic preacher; Terry Radigan, who plays completely grown-up songs of heartbreak and hope; and Tuelo, who is just as close to pure spirit as you will ever hear. But there are so many more. The people playing music right now are the ones who teach me, every day. If you really want to know what I love most, you should come to the American Folk Art Museum some Friday evening. I host Free Music Fridays, a free music series there, and it happens most weeks, and I think the musicians who play there are among the very best in the world. AHC: What do you think makes for a good song, as you're writing and composing, is there a sudden moment when you know you've found the right mix, that perfect angle of light, so to speak? Lara: I have no idea. Honestly, if I knew the answer to that, I would just write like that all the time. most of the songs I write are awful, of course, and then something comes out and it’s not, and then it’s like you don’t want to touch it too hard for fear it’ll dissolve. And even when I write a good one, I never know if really okay until I’ve played it out live in front of a crowd. I need to hear it bounce back to me from the audience to tell if it’s really okay, because my best songs are conversations I’ve having with the audience. Like, when I’m done playing, I expect someone to continue to the conversation. AHC: Do you consider music to be a type of healing art, the perfect vehicle through which to translate a feeling, a state of rupture/rapture, hope lost and regained? Does the writing and creating of the song save you in the kinds of ways that it saves us, the listener? Lara: No. I love that it heals some people, but that’s not how it works for me. There’s no magic in it, any more than there’s magic in breathing, or eating. Or, if you want to be contrary, music is magical because everything is magical. It’s not any more magical than anything else. It’s people that give it power. Music has no magic without people. In that way, I suppose, it’s like love. AHC: What are your fondest musical memories? In your house? In your neighborhood or town? On-tour, on-the-road? Lara: If I told you outright, I’d have to kill you. Maybe one day you’ll hear about some of those stories in some of my songs. Who knows? Maybe I’ve already put them into songs. AHC: Tell us more about the Free Music Fridays series at the American Folk Art Museum. It was named the "Best Manhattan Music Venue" for 2016 by New York Music Daily. Could you talk more about that? Lara: This is my seventh year working on Free Music Fridays at the American Folk Art Museum, and I book only original songwriters — cover songs are strictly prohibited, except for occasional performances of songs in the public domain. In that way, the music is a reflection of the museum’s mission, which is to help shape the way the art of the self-taught is understood. Most of our musicians are self-taught, at least in some way, and almost all of them are self-propelling, because the music industry isn’t handing out record contracts like it used to. The series has evolved based on what I wanted to see in the world: a listening environment, which benefits both the audience and the performer; where all the musicians get paid; and every performer is extraordinarily talented (but not necessarily famous); and no one talks during sets; and there is also wine. I do all the booking, and I’m also the sound engineer and the bartender. Did I mention we have wine? AHC: Do you have any words of advice or encouragement for other musicians and singer-songwriters out there who are just starting out and trying to find their voice and their way in this world? What are the kinds of things that you tell yourself when you begin to have doubts or are struggling with the creative process? Or what kinds of things have others told you that have helped push you past moments of self doubt/creative blocks? Lara: Don’t ever, ever ask someone what they think about your work. It doesn’t matter what other people think about your work. It only matters what you think about your work. Don’t set rigid and arbitrary deadlines for your successes or milestones. It’s your music and your work and it takes as long as it takes. Don’t knock having a non-music job. Some of the most amazing artists and musicians you’ve ever known had and have non-music jobs that allow them to pay the bills and be wildly imaginative and creative in their artistic endeavors. Don’t treat yourself worse than you would treat other people, and don’t be an asshole to anyone. It’s exhausting, for one thing, and it’s also a dick move. Ask for advice. Ignore most of the advice you get. Help someone out who’s not as far along as you, because it will help you see how far you’ve come and it’s also the right thing to do. Read books and poetry and dance a lot and go look at art and also flowers. And remember that it’s more fun to be the worst musician in the room than it is to be the best musician in the room. Surround yourself with people who are more talented than you are and you will never lack for inspiration or a sense of awe and humility. AHC: Your latest album is 2013's The Wishing Stone Songs. Could you talk some about this album and where the muses of this particular record lie for you? Do you have any new projects moving forward or musical ideas that are percolating for the future? Lara: The Wishing Stone Songs was born during a pretty dark time in my life, and those songs are essentially a record of the roadmap I used to get out of that period. Which is not to say it’s a sad album. It’s just a complicated collection of songs that are bound together by a common theme. While I was working on it, I imagined that The Wishing Stone was a dive bar that used to be much nicer, and that each of the songs on the album was the story about one of the bar’s regulars. That’s not explicitly stated anywhere on the album, but that’s what I thought. So that’s how I picked the songs. And I tried to tell those stories as truthfully as possible. I was lucky enough to have some of the very best musicians in the world playing with me on it, including Mark Marshall, Cat Popper, Tarrah Reynolds, Eleanor Whitmore, Kate Kilbane, Gerald Menke, Shaky Dave Pollack and a whole bunch more. And then I went nuts and had a 24-page fully illustrated book made, so the actual CD packaging is really just a work of art, thanks to Jennifer Noonan, who did the illustrations, and Gail Ghezzi, who did all the graphic design. I’m very proud of the whole thing. Now I’m at the very early stages of my next project. I’ve got a new collection of songs, and I’m not sure what fits together and what doesn’t, but I’m excited about exploring the stories. I haven’t decided how I’m going to release it all yet, or when, but I will be very loud about it when I do, and I’ll make sure to tell everybody. In the meantime, I’m easy to find on places like Twitter and Facebook and Instagram, and I have a website that I occasionally remember to update. Comments are closed.
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December 2023
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