Tapping Into Myriad Subjects:

Christine Lavin To Headline

At Flagpole Radio Café

By Janis Gibson

Christine Lavin will be the musical guest artist at the March 19 edition of Flagpole Radio Café, which will begin at 7 pm in the theater of Edmond Town Hall. As anyone who has ever seen the singer-songwriter-raconteur perform knows, Ms Lavin’s infectious joy and sense of humor is as sure to make you laugh as her humanitarian heart and consciousness is to touch your soul, and perhaps raise a lump in your throat.

In short, she will fit in very well with the variety show format of the Flagpole Radio Café. And, in fact, Ms Lavin is very familiar with radio programs: For four years she hosted Slipped Disks on XM satellite radio, playing CDs slipped to her backstage by compatriots. She is also the occasional guest host for the City Folk Sunday Breakfast Show on WFUV-FM at Fordham University, as well as regular guest on National Public Radio, where she introduced one of her most enduring popular songs, “New Age Sensitive Guys,” which lyrics get the occasional update.

I spoke with Ms Lavin recently, as she was driving with her sister Albany, N.Y., to present a song at the National Wildlife Rehabilitation Association’s annual conference. Called “Hole in the Bottom Of the Sea,” it was written in reaction to last year’s oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico, and has become “a work in progress that has grown to include a number of artists.” Part of the reason she was presenting it to the association members is to be sure it is accurate before recording it, and committing it to an illustrated book.

“This song, about a planetary problem and windmills, geothermal solutions, has opened up to involved more than me. Different people are recording different verses that will be part of the release. It has involved a whole lot of people all over the place. Among those singing a verse are Don White, Claudia Russell, Bruce Kaplan, Buskin & Batteau, Jenny Lynn Stewart and an eighth grade chorus from New Jersey,” she said.

“The conference of the NWRA went great,” Ms Lavin said this week via e-mail. “And next Tuesday in New York City, we are adding an ‘all-star choir’ to the ending — so far we have Ervin Drake, author of “It Was A Very Good Year” and “Good Morning Heartache,” Julie Gold, author of “From A Distance” (Bette Milder hit), and Sarah Rice, who played the original Joanna in Sweeney Todd on Broadway, along with a dozen others.”

Ms Lavin enjoys the irony of the popularity of her “science songs” as “I never got good grades in science, even if the subject interests me.” Her song “Amoeba Hop” has been turned into a science/music book by illustrator Betsy Franco Feeney and received the stamp of approval from The International Society of Protistologists as well as a Best Book Award from the American Association for The Advancement of Science.

The book The Pluto Files: The Rise And Fall Of America’s Favorite Planet, written by Neil deGrasse Tyson, head of the Hayden Planetarium in Manhattan, includes the complete lyrics to her song “Planet X,” which details Pluto’s history and planetary status debate in rhyme.

Ms Lavin’s shows are at times free flowing; the audience never knows what she may do.

“Neither do I,” she quipped. “Lighting guys are always asking me for a set list, but I rarely follow it. I just tell them to keep me well lit…” That request generally works, unless she is doing a song wearing a miner’s helmet as she walks among the audience, occasionally spotlighting and singing to a member.

Ms Lavin is the fourth of nine children. She started playing the guitar at 12 — thanks to guitar lessons offered by PBS.

“You sent them a dollar for a book, and followed along. The TV teacher was Laura Weber. She taught guitar at San Francisco State, and the PBS station in San Francisco hired her to do it on TV. The reception wasn’t great where we lived, so one of my brothers held the antenna outside the window! Twenty-six years later, I got to meet her at one of my concerts; that was quite a thrill.

“In this time when public television funding by the government is under attack,” she added, “I’d like to go on record that without PBS, I wouldn’t have the career I do. And neither would several other performers. Nanci Griffith learned from her, too.”

When she began writing songs, “I tried to write serious songs, but they often came out funny. That wasn’t my intention; I was just as surprised as others with what I wrote.”

The pleasure in her songs for an audience is often the familiarity to them… the shared life experiences, such as the bad dates in “What Was I Thinking?” (“which has had about 20 versions,” she notes), or people whose look doesn’t change, as described in “Prisoners of Their Hairdos.” But she can write those touching, haunting songs as well.

She recalled the first time she sang “The Kind Of Love You Never Recover From” in a theater 1989.

“It was during a sound check at a place in Connecticut; I had just written it and I wanted to hear how it sounded in a theater. I noticed an older man listening in a doorway, and afterward he asked me what recording it was on, saying, ‘That is the story of my life!’ When I told him it wasn’t recorded yet, he said I must record it soon and told he his story. That’s when I knew I had tapped into something.” The song has become her most requested number.

She finds writing to be exciting and can be inspired by most anything, and sometimes “an idea takes over and I can’t work on anything else until it is done.” She generally performs a song to audiences for six months to a year before recording.

Ms Lavin is very generous in sharing her stage with other performers, either introducing new acts at her shows, or bringing a fellow performer in the audience onstage for a number.

“You’ll often see a performer acknowledge another who is in the audience,” she said, “but a lot of people may have no idea of who the performer is. I figure if there are great people in the audience it is a missed opportunity not to bring them on stage and share their talent. I usually don’t ask them about performing in advance; in the folk business it is more fun to surprise them.”

Ms Lavin has recorded 20 solo albums, the most recent being Cold Pizza For Breakfast on Yellow Tail Records. She has also produced nine compilation CDs showcasing the work of dozens of songwriters whose work she loves. One of these recordings, the food-themed “One Meat Ball,” includes a 96-page cookbook that she edited.

Ms Lavin also writes freelance for various publications. Her latest book project, Cold Pizza for Breakfast: A Mem-Wha? is available in paperback, Kindle, iPad, and audio book formats. “Just One Angel,” her latest compilation project (22 artists, 22 Christmas/Hanukkah/Solstice/New Year’s songs), was just released in time for the 2010 holiday season.

In addition to her upcoming appearance in Newtown, Ms Lavin added this note to her e-mail this week:

“My big thing coming up — I’ve been working on a project with Gene Weingarten, Pulitzer Prize winning writer at The Washington Post — I can’t give any details but it will be posted on Friday afternoon at The Washington Post website [www.WashingtonPost.com]. I can tell you it’s a political song that will be equally enjoyed by Liberals and Conservatives. Very unusual. And the Post will make available downloadable sheet music so anybody who hears it who has musical talent can sing the song themselves.”

Tickets for Flagpole Radio Café Ticket are $18 for adults, $15 for students and senior citizens, and are available at www.FlagpoleProductions.org. Edmond Town Hall is at 45 Main Street in Newtown.

If further information is needed, send email to info@flagpoleproductions.org or call 203-364-0898.