"Songwriting is a challenging thing.": Q&A with bluegrass fiddler Sara Watkins

POSTED: Thursday, February 18, 2010, 5:41 PM

Filed Under: Interview | Music

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Bluegrass fiddle-ette Sara Watkins defected from her family band Nickel Creek to strike out on her own with her eponymous debut solo effort (Nonesuch). I called Watkins up to talk about finding her own voice and what inspires her in anticipation of her opening gig for folker John Prine.

City Paper: There are a lot of standards on this record, and from what I've read even more in your live set, yet there is a cohesive feel that comes through and colors the entire record as one piece. There is a real self-consciousness about being as original as possible and a musical tendency to shy away from covers.

Sara Watkins: I don't really think of a lot of them as covers. Growing up with bluegrass, there are just so many traditional songs that you knew. A lot of the culture is to just play with people, so there are a lot of songs that are common so people can jump in. To me, a cover is a Morrissey song or something like that. But, there are songs that have been around long enough to have a certain existence on their own, without seeming like you are throwing a bone to the audience hoping they'll recognize one they might know. Emmy Lou Harris and Allison Krauss have made entire careers of playing other peoples material, but not by being "cover artists."

CP: Is it fair to say that your voice comes through on the record?

SW: I didn't really go into this with a certain message that I meant to have come across. My main concern was to not fake it by putting a song on the record thinking it might be what I want to hear or play five years down the line. My only concern really was whittling my record down from an even bigger list of songs that I felt went well together, it was less of a personal goal to do it topically. I didn't go into it with the conscious mindset to keep the finished piece so diverse, it just sort of happened more stylistically as the process went on.

CP: Well, I can say it really speaks to me. To be honest, I had never heard any of your stuff until your appearance on "A Prairie Home Companion" not long ago, and it coincided with a really difficult time in my life. So, what drew me to you were the ideas of kindness, loss, coping, seeking comfort when finding uncertainties that can be found in your music. Particularly on "My Friend" and more than anything on "Where Will You Be?" They really seem to stand for something contrary to the popular Lady Ga Ga ideas of self obsession and "sorry for partying" culture that is being portrayed as the "normal" life path for twentysomethings nowadays.

SW: When I was writing those songs they each came out fairly quickly, though months apart from each other. But, in each case, I would have a certain thinking or mood or be going through something fairly deep for me and it would boil down to a certain phrase or seed of thought. With "Where Will You Be?" it was the repetition of that chorus, along the lines of "When this happens, when that happens, when this happens, where will you be?" That actually got in my head before a Nickel Creek show and I got back to it afterwards. All this happened after I got off the phone with my friend and a few minutes later texted a line that summed up where my brain and heart were at the time, and I built the song around that. So, that is how these particular songs came out. But, I am still learning how to craft things. Songwriting is a challenging thing.

CP: Something that has struck me about your music is its ability to reach outside of a strictly traditional folk or bluegrass experience. I wonder what you think about regionalism and what you have seen in the receptions you have gotten across the country.

SW: I've been very fortunate in having an audience from people that keep track of Nickel Creek, so I've had more of a warm welcome than a lot of people in my shoes. But, I do feel like I am almost starting over, and it depends, right now I'm still really just building things up. I started doing my own shows last year and the audience was mainly people that were following me to begin with. I'll have a better answer after I play more festivals and have more chances to see new people and how they react. Bluegrass crowds may or may not like something that's not straight bluegrass, some people don't like instrumentals, there's a really diverse group that used to listen to Nickel Creek. Finding anyone that speaks to you is kind of a challenge, people come to shows already being really involved in that search, and most feedback on the ability to see something unique that isn't being crammed down their face like a lot of the pop stuff is. Just the other night I was speaking with a friend whose band is doing really well despite not much hype about their previous record because it's lasting longer. There are a lot of us out there doing it, and there has been a lot of change over in the past few years, and probably will be at least ten more years of interesting times. It's hard to make it out to see everybody and spread the word. But, a lot of people are looking for something that hasn't been hyped so much and bought and paid for by ad people that just want to jumpstart it. I think a lot of people that are dissatisfied with that are looking elsewhere and trying to find something that means something to the artist so it can mean something to them.

CP: I think part of what makes the music so rich definitely has to do with the subtleties of the messages. Everyone can find something if they look for it or lose themselves in it, a lot like you mentioned earlier. Your album does a good job of mirroring the human experience in life by leaving room to appreciate a nice melody for its own sake, or stare out into the abyss and find your true self reflected in it. As terrifying as it can be, there's something beautiful in being taken there.

SW: I'm still kind of amazed by that. It's really hard to find things that appeal to you on that level that you want, or that show you something familiar that you can identify with somewhere in your life, whether it be topical, aggression or something completely different that you want to feel in your life. It's so hard to find that stuff, but when people do they're so happy. I remember when I found Summerteeth by Wilco, I totally identified with the instrumentation and the message immediately. But some other stuff requires a little bit of time to dive into and find a way to approach. When I first heard Of Montreal it took me the longest time to figure out why it got under skin so much, but then I started loving it. So, there are lots of different ways to react. Whether that be to enjoy it and let it go without intruding on your pallet, or something along the lines of "Wow, that's totally different and I have never tasted anything like that! What is it?" The key is to do it as long as you can. My favorite artists of any craft just do it because that's what they love to do. The idea of somebody being a lifer is so intriguing to me and I feel like the stories, the songwriting, the history, all get so much more interesting. You can get so much more out of a song and its writer by knowing their story, and it does help me to listen to things when I know a little bit of background but am still not sure where things start and end.

CP: That is actually what drew me to you from the start. I remember on A Prairie Home Companion, you prefaced "My Friend" by saying a lot of people close to you saw themselves as the subject, even though they weren't originally. Aside from being a completely beautiful song, there is something inside there that adds a richness to experiencing you sing it.

SW: Haha, well thank you. That one was a very specific song, which is why it doesn't rhyme. A lot of my friends have thought it was about them when it wasn't, but as times have gone on it has changed, and honestly it's sometimes about me when I sing it.

Sara Watkins w/ John Prine, Fri., Feb. 19, Merriam Theatre, 250 S. Broad St., merriam-theater.com

Gerry

Posted 2010-02-18 14:58:34

Great interview! Thanks!

Posted by Tom Tiballi @ 5:41 PM Permalink | Post a comment

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