The Musical Odyssey of Maria Muldaur

All Photos: Alan Mercer   Make-Up & Hair: Susan Seligman   Photo Asst: Ginny Winn

I fell in love with Maria Muldaur's music a long time ago.  She has always been such an original.  Her music is very real and organic...no matter what the decade or musical style.  Maria is a "Grade A, World Class Singer" who has never stopped in fifty years of performing. 

Born Maria Grazia Rosa Domenica D'Amato in the Greenwich Village section of New York City, she was part of the American Folk Music Revival in the early 1960's. She recorded the mega-hit song 'Midnight At The Oasis' in 1974 and has continued to record thirty-nine albums in various musical styles from jazz and blues to "pop music from another generation" for children. 

 

Maria began her career as Maria D'Amato, performing along with John Sebastion and others, as a member of the 'Even Dozen Jug Band.' She then joined 'Jim Kweskin and His Jug Band' as a featured vocalist and occasional violinist.

 

During this time, she was part of the Greenwich Village scene that included Bob Dylan, and some of her recollections of the period, particularly with respect to Dylan, appear in Martin Scorsese's 2005 documentary film, 'No Direction Home.'

 

She married fellow Jug Band member Geoff Muldaur, and after the Kweskin band broke up the two of them produced two albums. Both of these albums are superb.  She began her solo career when their marriage ended in 1972, but retained her married name.

 

Maria recorded a total of five critically acclaimed solo albums before parting with Warner Bros. Records.  Since the mid-eighties she has released almost an album a year!  Every one of them is exceptional...as her many long-time fans will agree. 

 

I met Maria Muldaur for the first time in Cincinnati, Ohio right after her performance at the club 'Bogarts.'  She was phenomenal.  I have seen her many times in the passing years and when I turned professional as a photogrpaher I told her we had to shoot.  We were finally able to make that happen in 2006 when we worked together for her 'Bob Dylan Love Song' album.  This past summer she came back to Los Angeles so we could shoot the cover for her latest album 'Steady Love.'  With the help of Susan Seligman doing hair and make-up and Ginny Winn, who took the photos of Maria on her "first" album, we got some great photographs of Maria Muldaur now! 

AM:  I want to talk about your new album 'Steady Love.'  I LOVE IT! 

MM:  Oh thank you. 

AM:  What led you in this direction?

MM:  Of late I've made a series of albums for this small label in Canada called Stony Plain Records.  They have been a series of albums paying tribute to the early Blues Legends and Pioneers that so greatly influenced and inspired so many of us.

AM:  You have received a Grammy nomination too haven't you?

MM:  I have received three Grammy nominations!  Meanwhile I have also recently recorded a Jug Band album going back to my original roots.  My band that I travel with is mostly New Orleans flavored Blues R&B and what I call swamp funk.

AM:  What is swamp funk?

MM:  The music is very heavily influenced by the New Orleans piano style.  My agent told me I was getting known for doing all this vintage music but in real life I am doing much more contemporary stuff so why don't I do an album that reflects that.  I decided to go to the scene of the original crime, New Orleans and get together with an A-team of musicians.

AM:  I bet you know a lot of great musicians there don't you?

MM:  They are all musicians I've worked with before.  I knew where to go to get the sound I wanted.  Since I don't write it's always a challenge to find the right songs. 

AM:  You are known for always finding the best songs.

MM:  I may not write myself but I do have a knack for finding the good songs.  I know where to find them.

AM:  It must be hard to know which ones are the best to record.

MM:  It's always a cliffhanger until the day before we record.  Even though this is supposed to be a straight ahead Blues album, I can't help it that my spiritual side came out and there's several songs that are very Gospel.

AM:  Do you have a favorite song from the new album?

MM:  My favorite song is "I Done Made It Up In My Mind To Serve God Till I Die' that was recently recorded by Aaron Neville.  It's irrepressibly happy and joyful.  I also recorded Eric Bibb's 'Don't Let Nobody Bring Your Spirit Down.'  These are songs that everybody loves.  When I sing them live everybody comes up to my CD table afterwards and wants to know which CD has that song.  Another song that fits that description is a song I've been singing live for years and years, Percy Mayfield's 'Please Send Me Someone To Love.'  I could have retired by now if I had recorded it earlier.  That's the big showstopper of my show and people rush up to the table and want the CD with that song.  We've always had to say that I haven't recorded it yet!  Now I've got it so everybody who ever wanted it better get it! (Laughing)

AM:  I have always loved your version of that song and wanted you to record it as well!

MM:  Another song that is really good is called 'Walk By Faith' and it's full of good spiritual advice.  I also do some playful songs like Sugar Pie De Santo's 'Soulful Dress.'  There's a little of everything on it but it's all spirited and raw.

AM:  Did it take you a long time to record this album?

MM:  We recorded all the tracks in two and a half days.  We had one rehearsal the night before the sessions and we just went in and cut them.  With the budgets we are given to work with these days that's the way to do it.  I get the guys who don't have to think about it.  They can play this in their sleep.

AM:  What motivates you to keep recording?  Isn't this like your 35th album?

MM:  I think if you include a couple of compilation albums this is my 39th album.  We are 37 years away from 'Midnight At The Oasis.'  I've been going to fast to count but my next project is a tribute to my favorite Blues Artist Memphis Minnie.  I have a bunch of guest artists like Bonnie Riatt and Ruthie Foster, who I just adore. 

AM:  I know you were friends with Phoebe Snow because you did some recordings with her.  Can you tell me a bit about her?

MM:  I met her in 1971 before I did 'Midnight At The Oasis' before anyone knew who she was.  She was hanging out at Gerde's Folk City and she came up to me.  Here is this young gal wearing no make-up and a sweatshirt and jeans.  She told me she was a fan of my music.  Then she told me she liked Memphis Minnie too.  She whipped out her guitar and  played this GREAT version of 'In My Girlish Days.' 

AM:  What did you think of that?

MM:  She blew me away!  My jaw dropped and I thought who is this?  We bonded right then and there and were dear friends all through that time.  We both came up right around the same time.  We both hit it nationally and had big hits.  Over the years we shared everything from the ups and downs of the music business to the heartbreaks and joys of Motherhood.  A couple years ago I told her of my intention to record this tribute album and she loved the idea.  Unfortunately she fell ill and was unable to do anything but fortunately she had already recorded that song on one of her albums and Sony is letting us license the song so Phoebe will be part of this Memphis Minnie Sisterhood.  That is very special to me that they allowed us to do that. 

AM:  Can you tell me a little about meeting Janis Joplin? 

MM:  According to a book her sister wrote she was at a party in Austin that the Jug Band was playing at.  This was the Hippie Enclave of the early Sixties.   All the Hipsters in Austin gave us this party and we all played music, which is what we used to do in those days.  I'm talking not just on stage but jamming informally.   Apparently everyone asked Janis to perform but she didn't want to because she was intimidated by me.  I only learned this a few years ago in the book. 

AM:  How did this make you feel?

MM: I was very touched by that.  I met her during the Summer of Love when the Jug Band came to California to play at the Fillmore and the Avalon Ballroom.  Bill Graham had us on and Janis and her group opened for us. 

AM:  Were you impressed by her talent?

MM:  I was blown away.  I remember hearing her sing 'Ball and Chain' which was an old Etta James song.  Etta was obviously her biggest influence.  Bill Graham asked me what I thought and I said, "Oh my God!  She's amazing!"  He told me she wanted to meet me so after her set he introduced us.  The first thing she said was, "Do you get high?"  (laughing)  Back in those days it wasn't a given, but we couldn't light up in the dressing room so we stood on a ledge and smoked.  When I think of it now it gives me the creeps.  We both stood on the ledge of the window sill of the dressing room on the second floor and shared a joint. 

AM:  Do you remember what you talked about?

MM: Oh yes, we talked about which musicians we liked.  We both were into Memphis Minnie.  We ended up having the same manager, Albert Grossman so I would see her at various music festivals and I remember hanging out with her the night we found out that Otis Redding had passed away.   She was so bummed because she was going to open for him on New Years Eve.  I have very fond memories of Janis and I thought she was wonderful!

AM:  Has anyone ever asked you to write a book about that time?

MM:  So many people think I tell good stories but I'm so busy singing that I suppose I'll do it when I run out of things to sing.  Bonnie Raitt thinks I should do a 'One Woman Show' and tell stories.  When they made the film about Bob Dylan called 'Don't Look Back' the producers were very pleased with my recall. 

AM:  You do have amazing recall.  So many musicians can't remember any of it.

MM:  I was not only in the Sixties I do remember it!  I guess I just didn't get quite as twisted and messed up as everybody else.  (Laughing)

AM:  I love your 'Classic Live' album with the song  'Searchin.'   What made you want to record that song?

MM:  WOW!  I knew it from the Coasters because I was an early Rock n' Roller.  I was into all that in the Fifties.  It's a cool, funky song.  I always picked funky Soul and R&B tunes. 

AM:  What did you do musically in the fifties?

MM:  I had two Doo Wop groups in the Fifties in New York City.  I had one group in Junior High with three Puerto Rican girls called 'The Cameos' and then in High School I went to a different neighborhood and hooked up with three Jewish girls from the Bronx and we formed a band called 'The Cashmeres.'  I was the leader and main instigator in both bands.

AM:  Did you sing original music?

MM:  We wrote a bunch of songs but this was before Bob Dylan raised the bar and I wouldn't even dream of writing a song after him.  I was listening to R&B intensely at that time.  I loved Ruth Brown and Muddy Waters, all the early R&B artists.  I was listening to Allen Freed on the radio at the time he coined the phrase 'Rock n' Roll.'  That is my roots.  My Mom tried to give me piano lessons and I learned to play Fats Domino.  I made her crazy playing 'Blueberry Hill.'  That must be why I recorded 'Searchin.'  I haven't thought of it in years. 

AM:  People think of you as a rock singer but you're really an R&B singer.

MM:  I'm much more R&B.  I'm more Roll than Rock!  My hit was a pop song.  My whole career can be seen as a long and rambling odyssey through all sorts of American Roots music.  I've played old time fiddle and sang bluegrass. 

AM:  Did you purposefully decide to educate all of us with this classic American music?

MM:  I've never purposely decided practically anything.  Talk about walk by faith!  I had no idea when Geoff Muldaur and I broke up that I would continue recording and making music.  I thought I would be a waitress in Woodstock.  Instead I got an amazing opportunity to come out to California and make my first solo record.  All I thought was I was going to get out of the freezing cold blizzardy winter. 

AM:  Did you get a lot of positive reinforcement back then?

MM:  I've always done what Joseph Campbell called following your bliss.  Music pulled me in at the age of five when I first heard Hank Williams and Kitty Wells on the radio.  Music has been the motivating force that has pulled me along.  I was always into authentic music.  I never had the thought that I needed a pop hit.  That was a lucky accident. 

AM:  You were on Warner Brother Records at a time when it was extremely prestigious.  Did you appreciate it?

MM:   Oh yes I appreciated it.  The Jug Band did an album or two for Warner/Reprise label.  That was the soulful, eclectic, left of center corner of the Warner's label.  After the band broke up they paid Geoff Muldaur and I to record two duet albums for them.

AM:  Both of those records are classics!

MM:  Then Geoff and I broke up personally and professionally and by a total fluke of amazing good fortune I ran into Mo Ostin (Warner Bros. President)  at Brooks Brothers in New York City where I was buying a good-bye present for my husband who was about to leave me.  He asked me how I was doing and I told him Geoff and I were separating.  He asked if I wanted to make a solo album.

AM:  And of course you said yes!

MM:   I really hadn't thought about it.  He told me I should do it so I rose to the occasion.  He invited me to the office for the afternoon.  Now love or money could not get you a whole afternoon with a record company president.

AM:  What did you talk about?

MM:  He picked my brain and asked what I wanted to do.  I told him I liked Ry Cooder and he said that's Lenny Waronker.  Let's call him and I'll tell him you want to make an album with him.  So he did call and told him about me wanting to make this album and I thought to myself, "I do!?!"  (Laughter)  The next thing I knew they sent me money to come to LA and make a record.

AM:  What did you think about that?

MM:  I thought this will pay a few months rent.  P.S. The rest is history. 

AM:  All five of your solo Warner Brother albums are exquisite. 

MM:  Thank you.   Here I was thinking I was being a waitress and just a few months later I am sitting in the studio with Ry Cooder, Dr. John, Jim Keltner, you name it, the best of the best. That was true of all the albums I made with Warners.  I got to work with Benny Carter and an All-Star Big Band, I got to sing a duet with Hoagy Carmichael. 

AM:  This is what I wanted to talk to you specifically about.  No one has a duet with Hoagy Carmichael.  It has to be at the end of Hoagy's life.

MM:  This is a very poignant story.  I wanted to record 'Old Rockin' Chair' because I heard Mildred Bailey do it.  This is proof that I wasn't trying to come up with the sequel to 'Midnight At The Oasis.'  Benny Carter called up Hoagy Carmichael, who he knew and told him I was going to cut his song.  He asked him to come down to the studio and play piano on it.  Hoagy told him, "Oh no I'm old now and my hands won't play good enough anymore."  Benny told him to at least come down and meet me since I'd be thrilled to meet him.  How often were people covering his songs at that point?

AM:  Nobody was and I'm so glad you did!

MM:  So he shows up at the studio looking quite dapper, really dressed to the nines with a "younger" woman.   She was about sixty and he was about seventy-five.  Lenny couldn't stand the fact that Hoagy Carmichael was in the studio and we weren't using him.  So Lenny asked Hoagy if he could at least show me how to do it, which was sort of a ruse.  So he did start playing and singing the song with this far away look in his eyes and when he was playing I was transported right out of Burbank into the deep South.  It was like magnolia petals were floating out of the piano.  Half way through he stopped and told me, "Miss Maria I don't have to tell you how to sing this song.  Just sing it like you're telling a true story.

AM:  That sounds like good advice from the master.

MM:  In that moment I realized how he wrote that song when he was young but now it was true for him.  I was very touched.  We thanked him and went in to record the song and he stayed sitting with the producer.

AM:  You had that all-star band playing.  Who was in it?

MM:  Ray Brown and Earl Palmer are in the band!  All these killer guys like Harry "Sweets" Eddison, Snooky Young, it was a who's who of the top jazz players.  They were all these cats who had played for Billie Holliday.  They don't make mistakes.

AM:  No they don't!

MM:  All of a sudden Hoagy says, "When I used to perform the song with Jack Teagarden, we used to do this harmony at the end.  Would you like me to do that?"   Lenny said, "Boy would I."  So we quickly set up another mike in the vocal booth.  I sang my little heart out and I was so moved that he was there.  I blew my part at the end because all of a sudden I was supposed to sing harmony.  Lenny was about to say take five everyone when Hoagy said, "Wait we blew our part and we need to do it again."  This is the cool part of the story.  Everybody just looked at one another and everyone simultaneously realized that it was probably ten or twenty years since Hoagy had been in a recording studio and he didn't realize we were on separate tracks and therefore if they got their part right we would only have to redo our part.  Benny made everybody sit down and said "OK everyone we are going to do it again."  Everybody just pretended to do the whole song again so we could get our part right.  Nobody said anything.  We all knew it would be embarrassing to Hoagy if we did.  Well we got our part right the second time and he was so into it he stayed around and helped us work out the harmonies with another song. 

AM:  You recorded a lot of Wendy Waldman songs at that time.  Did you just like them?

MM:  She's a fabulous songwriter!  She is very soulful.  People still ask me to sing "Mad, Mad Me" and I've never really done it live very much.   It seems to have really touched people over the years.  I recorded 'Vaudeville Man', 'Gringo En Mexico,' ' Back By Fall' and a couple more.  That was the good thing about Warners.   I got Jr. Walker to play saxophone on 'Clean-Up Woman.'  Stevie Wonder played on a tune.  It was awesome!

AM:  I have discovered that many people are into 'Midnight At The Oasis' like it's a new song.  Carmen Carter, the singer from 'Dancing With The Stars" is doing club dates and she is singing 'Midnight' now.  She let me know how much she likes your version.

MM:  Really!?! WOW!  Well God bless her.  That song took on a life of it's own and it was the last song I did for the record.  It's funny to think that my husband leaving me and me deciding to get him a present and meeting Mo Ostin ultimately led to my hit record.

AM:  Is it true it wasn't your favorite song?

MM:  I wasn't crazy about the song but Lenny said we needed one mid tempo song for the record.  Lenny wasn't wild about it either but he thought it was cute so if I wanted to record it we could.  We called up Freebo to play bass and cut the tune.  I think God rewarded me for my gesture of gratitude.  Still to this day that is the song that catches everyone's attention. 

AM:  You can sing it to a five year old and they will know it!

MM:  Yes, it's amazing. 

AM:  What inspired you to record the children's albums?  I believe you have four available.

MM:  I love kid's music.  I got approached to record them and I'm a freelancer.  The wonderful golden era of Warner Bros. is over.  If someone approaches me and says we'd like to do a record with you, if it's in any way appealing to me, I'll do it.  This wonderful label called 'Music For Little People' approached me in the early nineties about doing these records.

AM:  Did they have specific ideas for you?

MM:  They let me do whatever I wanted.  On all the albums I have chosen vintage songs that I used to love when my Mom or my Aunt would sing them to me as a kid.  These are songs that were written for adults in a kinder, more gentler era.  They were all hits on the radio when I was growing up.  They are light, positive, cheery and beautifully written.  I think kids deserve to hear beautifully crafted music.

AM:  These albums are popular too aren't they?

MM:  I get letters from teachers and parents all the time saying thank you for saving us from Barney!  I get the best jazz players in the Bay area to play on them.  We just keep it light and whimsical, but very hip.  Grandparents love it because it's music from their era.

AM:  I especially like your Shirley Temple album.

MM:  When I was approached to record the Shirley Temple album I wondered why? She did them all so perfect.  In the days before overdubbing that little gal was on the money.  She could swing and she was so in tune.  Then I realized after listening to a bunch of it that a lot of it was just recorded as the soundtrack to the movie.  So I lifted the arrangements because they are so fabulous and there is no way to improve on them.   I had a ball recording them.  My latest recording is the Jug band music for little kids.  All the songs on it are from the twenties and thirties.  They are darling.  They could write a tune back in those days.       

To learn more about Maria Muldaur visit her web site www.mariamuldaur.com