Interview with Singer-Songwriter Emily Jane White

 photography by Kristin Kofer


                    "Words will pass through our bodies, above our heads. They'll vanish, and we'll be lost. Far off, up high. Absent from ourselves: we'll be spoken machines, speaking machines. Enveloped in proper skins but not our own. Violated by proper names. Not your's, not mine...But what about us? Come out of their language. Try to go back through the names they've given you." Luce Irigaray asks "How do we rid ourselves of such oppressive names?" Weather questions of gender disparity or racial discrimination, Emily Jane White has built an impressive musical career around such heavy, necessary philosophical inquiries. "Damaged within, said I'm a hollow house of a man" she sings in The Preacher. "I did not ask for these things." A song grappling with universal (F)athers, priestly, authoritative hindrances to the self caught underneath a current of unasked for names, forced designations. "Mother, he's got me up against the wall, fading into a line so small...I lay face down with my heart on the ground" Black Silk works poignantly with metaphors of the devil, the abstract place where we store our unexplainables, our difficult ones. Emily sings the feminine in a voice of her own making, reclamation. In an age of endlessly disposable things, here is a music that wrestles with the dark of our bias, shedding its old skin for new ones, building exits from conformity, and laying the ground upon which more equitable things will one day be built.



AHC: What has this journey, this life in music been like for you, the highs and the lows, and what life lessons do you feel you've picked up along the way?

Emily: Music has served many purposes in my life- social, creative, therapeutic, spiritual. Being an introverted artist is very lonely at times, but necessary in order to create the kind of work I want to make. It's a lifestyle choice and emotional commitment to the work. For me, songwriting is something I can not live without. As for life lessons, I've been challenged in staying true to myself and my work many times. Some of these struggles have been very painful and I've learned a lot from them. 


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?

Emily: My parents signed me up for piano lessons when I was 5. My earliest musical moments are with the piano. I must have been 6 years old when I performed my first piano recital. I did not study piano rigorously during my youth, in fact, I stopped piano lessons in the first grade because I didn't like the pieces I was asked to learn. I didn't like reading music. I wanted to play the pop music I heard on the radio, I wanted to play pieces I liked. Between first grade and the age of 14 I messed around on the piano and my dad also taught me some guitar chords. For example, when I was 13 I told him I liked that song "Zombie" by the Cranberries, and he figured out the chords and taught it to me. I was baffled at how easy it was for him to do that. I returned to piano lessons at the age of 15 with a fabulous teacher named Marilyn Hagar who practiced an expressive arts approach to music, and she let me learn pieces I wanted to learn. She also taught me some basic improv techniques and that's when I began songwriting. During high school, it being the 90's and all, my biggest songwriting influence was Tori Amos. Her album "Little Earthquakes" probably saved my life. 


AHC: Do ideas for new songs occur to you at any moment or is it more of a sit-down-and-make-it-happen sort of thing? Which comes first to you, the lyrics or the music?

Emily: I usually sit down at the piano or with the guitar and start to work out some kind melody or chord of progression. The music and the lyrics often happen simultaneously. I use a hand held recorder and will piece-meal songs together, recording small sections at different times. I do a lot more revising than I used to. I love revising songs, making them better, stronger. 


AHC: Who are some of your favorite songwriters and musical influences? Is there a particular album or song that you can't live without? 

Emily: Patsy Cline, Johnny Cash, Gene Vincent, Townes Van Zandt, The Cramps, Kate Bush, Philip Glass, Tori Amos
Albums: The Cramps - Bad Music for Bad People, Kate Bush - The Red Shoes


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?

Emily: It's all based on sensations in the body. When something is right, I feel it, and I trust that feeling. 


AHC: Do you remember the first song you ever wrote?

Emily: I do recall writing joke songs with a friend on the guitar when I was 13, but I don't remember how they go. I have faint memories of a few songs I wrote on the piano when I was 17. 


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, hope lost and regained? As a listener of music I have this impression, I wonder, as the artist, the creator, do you have this feeling about the transformative power of song? Does the writing and creating of the song save you in the kinds of ways that it saves us, the listener?

Emily: This is a great question. I believe whole heartedly in the power of music as a healing force. Music and art have the capacity to reach places in people where words fail. I live to write, and it's the most fulfilling practice I have in my life. I became a musician through a dire need to find solace and emotional relief. I never intended for it to become my life in this way, but I'm grateful for the way my musical life has unfolded. I think music has truly saved me. 


AHC: When you set out to write an album of songs, how much does 'where the world is' in its current moment, culturally, politically, otherwise, influence the kinds of stories you set out to tell?

Emily: I try to stay current on what's happening in the world on a national and international level. If you read the bio for my album it states specifically what I chose to write about. I particularly pay close attention to issues of race and gender in American politics. 


AHC: What are your fondest on-tour, on-the-road memories?

Emily: My fondest memories are of jogging each morning in a new place, not knowing the territory at all, and happening upon something visually extraordinary. I've toured a lot in Europe and jogging has enabled me to see things I would not otherwise see. I also love meeting people at the merch table after the shows. 


AHC: Do you have any words of advice for young singer-songwriters who are starting out and struggling to find their voice and their way in the world?

Emily: There are no rules to songwriting, anything goes. If there's something that pains you, or something you have a charged feeling about, chances are it's song worthy. Spend time away from social media, and what other people are doing. Take time to detach and truly explore your own world, knowing that your world is equally as valid as anyone else's. Songwriting is a safe place to explore almost any topic, sound, and sensation. It requires a rawness and vulnerability. Anything you need to do to bring forth that rawness, seize it. Give yourself all the permission you need. The permission you give yourself will inspire others to create as well. 


AHC: Do you have any new projects that you'd like to mention?

Emily: I am starting to write/record a new album....and there are certainly more projects on the horizon but I don't have anything new to talk about right now. 



For more visit www.emilyjanewhite.com/