This interview was conducted by Mary Wood Littleton: and is reprinted with her permission.
30 August 1994
NG: Hello, this is Nanci.
MWL: Hi, this is Mary Littleton.
NG: How are you?
MWL: I'm just great. Thank you so much for giving me the opportunity to talk to you.
NG: Well, I'm sorry that we're running so late and that you had such difficulties getting in touch with me.
MWL: No, that's fine. I can understand how all of that goes. Well, first of all I just want to say congratulations on your Grammy, your fortieth birthday, and your eleventh album.
NG: Well, thanks. That's a lot of things.
MWL: That's quite a year!
NG: Yeah, it's been a great year. But scary; it's scary turning forty.
MWL: Your new album seems to be at a looking back point. Is that kind of where you are?
NG: The new album is a real departure for me in my writing style in that it's not fiction, and it's real personal. I think that Other Voices/Other Rooms really contributed and it was really helpful to take a break from Nanci Griffith and do Other Voices/Other Rooms and reacquaint myself with all of the writers who had inspired me to become a writer especially Kate Wolf who wrote so personally and so internally. I think even in her last interview before she died she said she'd always wished that she could write fiction. And she'd never had the capacity to get outside of herself and I'd never had the capacity to get into myself. So it's almost like we were opposites.
MWL: I read an interview that you did with Lear's magazine published in January 1994 in which you stated that most of your songs were fiction and that there was no resemblance to persons living or dead or something like that. Certainly there are songs on some of your past albums, like Storms that have touched on some personal themes; but this album is really a beautiful thing to offer to the people who have followed you.
NG: Well, I've always been a very private and reclusive person. This album may be everything you didn't want to know about Nanci Griffith. Because there's always been this skeletal synopsis of what I was like as a person. So I think with this album it's all there it's real life.
MWL: When you were working on "Other Voices/Other Rooms," were you writing some of this?
NG: I had started writing this but most of the songs were finished really in the last month of '93 and the first two months of '94.
MWL: I heard that "Nobody's Angel" was the last song that you wrote for this album.
NG: It was the last song. It was written at the end of February.
MWL: That song, in particular, seems to have a lot of references to your older songs. I know there's a reference to "You Made This Love A Teardrop" when you say "I was the forest for love songs, the one who can't love wrong." I assume that was intentional?
NG: It was, yeah. I think that "Nobody's Angel" really says what this album is about. I feel like that emotionally I was really kind of asleep for twenty years. I was observing other people's lives and writing it. And the past two years I've really been involved in my own life for the first time. So it's kind of like I was asleep for twenty years and when I got the wake-up call emotionally, I had the emotional maturity of a twenty year old. So I think that "Nobody's Angel" really typifies what the whole album is about waking up.
MWL: You've described in your liner notes and in concert the incident of "The Flyer" somewhat. You said that there are people and events in your life that come along and you don't necessarily see that as coincidental, but intentional. And I see that theme running throughout the album as well. But was there an incident that inspired the song "The Flyer"?
NG: Oh "the Flyer" is a very true story. In fact one of my good friends and one the best songwriters I know was there when the incident happened John Gorka because we were flying together. He was really thrilled when it became a song. He said, "I remember that, I was there!" Normally no one would be able to recognize any situation or two characters as being any individuals at all except people that they know, and the songs wouldn't be written about people that they know because I don't know them. "The Flyer" is about that coincidence of passing through people and allowing yourself to pass through people instead of bumping into people.
MWL: There are so many things on this album, it's such a wonderful thing to hear. I hate to just dive right into some of this because I know it is deeply personal. But one of the songs that had the greatest impact on me initially and continues to is "These Days in an Open Book."
NG: It continues to do so for me as well. When I wrote it, we had such a hard time recording it. We tried recording it several times and I just couldn't get through it. We finally recorded it up in New York at Electric Lady with Larry Mullen and myself just sitting knee-to-knee and him playing drums on his leg and me playing guitar and singing without headphones on. That's the track that we ended up using. I was so close to the song. That's the reason I called the Indigo Girls and said I can't work this out and the came in and did the vocals which was amazing. What was amazing to me as well, because I hadn't listened to what the Indigos were working on for their album and they hadn't listened to what I was working on for my album, was that "These Days in an Open Book" and "On Grafton Street" were basically such similar thoughts to Emily's song "Least Complicated."
MWL: I knew that you and Emily were good friends, because I met her with you in Atlanta. They really add a beautiful harmony.
NG: They really do.
MWL: The album is dedicated to John.
NG: Uh-huh.
MWL: I assume this is the same John who is referenced in your first album There's a Light Beyond These Woods?
NG: Yes, it is.
MWL: And that is who you are referring to in "These Days in an Open Book"?
NG: Yes.
MWL: That was, I'm certain, a very significant event in your life. You've made references to the past twenty years, is that the time frame since you experienced this loss?
NG: It is, yeah. You know twenty years of mourning is a long time.
MWL: But you feel a different lease on life now?
NG: I feel like it was good for me to wake up for a little while. But I feel at the same time in some people's lives there's only one person that's ever going to make an impact on you emotionally. And I just happen to be one of those people.
MWL: Is that the same person you are talking about in "On Grafton Street"?
NG: Yes.
MWL: I wasn't completely sure, because you say that person is in Dallas now, but I thought that it was.
NG: It is, definitely.
MWL: There are other references that I would imagine are to him in some of your other songs over the years, and I'm not certain that they are, but I guess I just want to ask you that.
NG: Yeah, he's popped up several times. Just his image has popped up in songs and some songs that were fiction just the image of him, just the remembrance of the emotion of that has come several times.
MWL: On your Once in a Very Blue Moon album there's the song "Daddy Said." There's the line "and it's a pity that your lover died young, but you'll never get tired of livin' alone." Would that be a reference to him?
NG: That's definitely a reference.
MWL: In "The Last of the True Believers," where you say "there's a shadow on our wall where I once stood with him in mind & there's an empty space beside him where I do take my rest at night." Would that also be a reference?
NG: Yeah.
MWL: And in "One of These Days" you say "we met on a school bus rollin' thru the Autumn fields our Daddies raised.
" NG: That's fiction. I mean I'm drawing from that emotion, because I met him when I was very young. But that's fiction.
MWL: "Goodnight to a Mother's Dream" is a beautiful song, but it's perhaps one of the saddest songs you've ever written. Are these your true emotions here?
NG: Very much so.
MWL: Do you have a lot of regret in that area?
NG: I don't really have that much regret. I have that feeling, you know, of someday. I think that a lot of women are made to feel that they have not done the one thing that they were put on the Earth to do if they didn't do the normal thing, if they didn't take the most travelled path. And it's unfortunate. I have so many friends who have said the same thing. You know, my mother wanted so much for me. And she wanted me to have all of these things that she never got to fulfill within her lifetime. And, you know, maybe my mother was wrong. So that's really what this song is about. I think we're the first generation of women to experience that, because prior to that mothers were raising their daughters to be mothers.
MWL: When you were saying you had such difficulty getting through "These Days in an Open Book" in the studio, I would imagine that you had a similar experience when you recorded "Tecumseh Valley" for Other Voices/Other Rooms. Would that be true?
NG: "Tecumseh Valley" is difficult every night I sing it. And we've started performing "These Days in an Open Book" and it's difficult. But "Tecumseh Valley" is so difficult to get through just because the song has meant so much to me since such an early age. Townes Van Zandt has several songs that affect me that way, but "Tecumseh Valley" is probably the most affective song for me on stage. And Julie Gold songs are very, very emotional. "From a Distance" is always very emotional and difficult to get through. And "Southbound Train" is as much so, because we've been performing it for about three years.
MWL: I know that you and Julie Gold have a long-time friendship. In fact, you published "From a Distance," didn't you, because she didn't have a publishing company at the time?
NG: Right.
MWL: It was interesting that with all of these very personal songs written by you for this album, that you chose that one cover.
NG: Well, I just felt like Julie had been reading my mind when she wrote "Southbound Train." It was like the first time I heard "From a Distance," when I heard "Southbound Train" I thought that's just a brilliant, brilliant song so emotional and so universal.
MWL: The train motif has certainly occurred in a lot of your songs as well. As have all of the travel motifs. I've read in a lot of places that you write a lot when you're traveling. I can see how that would be a good time to write when you're away from everything and no one will interrupt you although I guess now with the advent of the cellular telephone people can call you anywhere and interrupt you. At least you have some blocks of time to relax and focus on something specific. About three years ago, when you were promoting Late Night Grande Hotel, you talked with someone at the L.A. Times about giving up the road and settling down. You were contemplating a life of just writing and performing occasionally. What kind of effect do you think the cessation of touring would have on your songwriting, and on you?
NG: I don't really know, because I've still not done it. I've still not gotten off the road. I won't know until I try.
MWL: Is that still something you want to do?
NG: It is. yeah. It's gets a little trying especially when you've done it all your life. So I would like to stop road work and stay home more. But I have no idea what kind of effect it will have.
MWL: You've said that the happiest times of your life were when you were in your twenties, driving yourself around the country playing music. But I guess you have a lot more you have to carry with you now.
NG: Yeah (laughing), I have a lot more baggage. James Hooker's very heavy.
MWL: You've said in the past few years that you definitely believe there is a resurgence of interest in folk music. I wonder if that's true? And, if you do believe that, what do you feel is the basis of that?
NG: I think we've had in the past five or six years the biggest rock acts in the world have been people whose roots began in folk music. That has created true interest in singer/songwriters and that's great. Their support alone has created a lot of interest groups like U2, R.E.M., Indigo Girls, and Counting Crows.
MWL: And they're all on the new album.
NG: That's right, they're all on the album.
MWL: I have had a difficult time even trying to define the term "folk." Obviously "traditional folk" is a little easier, but in the contemporary formed it's varied. I wonder if you still see contemporary folk as a specific genre or if you see it as an element that a lot of musicians can have in other forms of music.
NG: Well, I think what I've noticed about folk music and the people whose origins are in folk is that for so many years folk was a four-letter word in the music industry. There are a lot of artists who would otherwise have gone in another direction and been folk artists who ended up in the big country market right now, the big hoopla. It's not what I consider to be pure country; it's more folk. I think it's great that it's getting heard. But at the same time I think that folk music is a true American tradition just as well as country music is. It's sad to see it not given its due. It's sad that at the Grammy's every year they don't televise the Contemporary Folk category. I think this year was the first year that the Alternative category award was televised, but that's only because U2 and R.E.M. were nominated in that category. There are a lot of awards that weren't televised the Traditional [folk] award and the Gospel awards.
MWL: Yeah, the list of non-televised winners in the USA Today the following morning was more impressive than the list of televised winners. And your category was dominated by really great musicians this year.
NG: Right. That category is never televised It's amazing, there are several categories that are never televised. I was surprised that they did televise the alternative one. But like I said I think it was only because of U2 and R.E.M. In order to get them to come to the show, they were televised.
MWL: It's interesting that you bring them up, because a lot of people who are heavily into alternative would say they are no longer alternative, because they are popular, they are pop. They would say the same thing about a folk musician who became popular. They could no longer be folk. Because they'd achieved success, they would have to be considered country or country-pop if they had a market.
NG: I remember for three years in a row MCA forgot to nominate me for Contemporary Folk or for anything. Your record label is the initial place where you're submitted. And if your record label does not submit you, you do not get nominated, because that's the only way you end up on the ballot. I remember I was so disappointed, I thought this is terrible my record label doesn't even remember me enough to nominate me. It was heartbreaking. Then when MCA finally did nominate me for Contemporary Folk for my last MCA record, Late Night Grande Hotel, I was ejected from that category by the Grammy committee. They said I was no longer a folk artist.
MWL: Well, that may have been your least folk album.
NG: But I'm still a folk artist.
MWL: Absolutely. Do you feel you wasted the best years of your life or your career with MCA? I know you had a pretty good relationship with Tony Brown didn't you?
NG: I did. I learned a lot. I'd done four indy albums before I went with MCA. And back then it wasn't fashionable to be on an indy label. Now it is. Everybody wants to do an indy album before they go to a major label. MCA was a great learning experience for me. And I appreciate everything that they tried to do, as confused even all the way to Tony Brown as confused as they were about what to do with me. It's not anybody's fault. I mean they did a great job with me in Europe.
MWL: You're still with MCA in Europe, aren't you?
NG: Yeah, I am. I mean it's no one's fault that they couldn't find a place for me. Because at the time that my records came out, they belonged on triple-A alternative radio. Well, there were no alternative radio stations then. There really weren't any until two years ago. So it's not their fault. They had no outlet. They had college radio, and college radio was great to me. And that's all they could do with me, because I didn't fit on Country and I didn't fit on Pop. They didn't have a clue of what to do with me.
MWL: An book that was co-written by someone who's produced a few of your albums, Jim Rooney, sort of looks back at the folk scene in Cambridge in the late fifties and early sixties mentions the same trend with folk musicians that had any popularity and that were taken to Nashville, then they were considered Country although their music hadn't changed.
NG: I think that did happen. Except for a few people who had already reached a certain place where they were in their own category and could not be categorized. Bob Dylan, for example. It did not make him a Country artist because he came to Nashville and made Nashville Skyline. And it didn't make Joan Baez a Country artist because she came and worked in Nashville.
MWL: Do you like being in Nashville?
NG: I like living here. I think the quality of life . . . I actually live in a small town outside of Nashville.
MWL: Franklin.
NG: Yeah. And it's so much quieter and easier to live there than in New York or Los Angeles. So I really enjoy living in a small town, knowing a lot of people in the town who could care less who I am or what I do. In fact there's a veterinarian that . . . I eat lunch at this diner everyday and we oftentimes end up sitting together because we will be likestray cats coming in there to eat no tables. So we'll sit with each other. And, just a couple of weeks ago, he sat down to have lunch and he said, "You never told me you were famous." That was really funny, but I'd never really talked about it. He knew I was a songwriter, and he knew I wasn't in Country music, but he didn't know that I made records. His daughter had told him.
MWL: That's the way you would probably characterize yourself first anyway, isn't it, as a songwriter? You have talked about the time that you spent in Houston at the kitchen tables with the group of songwriters and the community that you had. Do you have that again in Nashville with Emmylou Harris, Harlan Howard, and Pat Alger?
NG: Well, I think that Emmylou and Harlan have been instrumental in keeping that going for me. And that's just because it's so important to them. That's how they got their musical start and they're maintaining it.
MWL: How do you think that the music that's played by Emmylou, Jimmie Dale Gilmore, and Lyle Lovett music a lot of people would consider Country how do you think that relates to folk?
NG: Emmylou started out as a folk singer and wandered into Country music, because she heard Louvin Brothers songs she wanted to sing. When she started going into the archives, she discovered that a lot of the music that she loved was considered Country, and that's how she evolved. I can't really speak for Lyle, even though I've know Lyle since he was 18 years old; he's one of my oldest acquaintances. I can't really say because in Lyle's early years, when I knew him, his biggest influences were Jesse Winchester, Eric Taylor, and Townes Van Zandt. I guess some of what they do you'd consider Country, and that would be his root base. Harlan Howard has always crossed all genres. And Jimmie Dale Gilmore, I think Jimmie's major influences were probably my major influences, we come from the same background Texas. We grew up listening to Woody Guthrie, Buddy Holly, and the Everly Brothers mixing that up into one bag.
MWL: That reminds me, a song on your new album, "This Heart," is a tribute to Buddy Holly. Is that right?
NG: Yes it is.
MWL: Does it also represent your new lease on life?
NG: It does. And it's been great fun to play. I made my debut on the stratocaster, because we don't have Sonny Curtis out on the road. So I was going to get someone else to play it and I brought the stratocaster in and I was fooling around with it and the band said, "No. you're the only one who can really do that Sonny Curtis/Buddy Holly lick, so you play it!" So I just did "Austin City Limits" with the Stratocaster, and it comes so naturally to pick it up and play it. It's a major influence on me.
MWL: This reminds me, in your liner notes you tell about an experience with a card reader in New York City. Was that experience something you had before or after you wrote this song?
NG: Um, I wrote this song before . . . no, I guess I wrote this song right after the first time I went to see her. She was just so right on about everything. And I didn't know this person from Adam. My dad had been saying to me, along with a couple of my close friends, "You never have fun, you've behaved like an old lady your whole life. And you never have fun, everything is so darn serious." This card reader said the same thing. When I first sat down, she laid my past out and said, "Wow! You've had a really hard life. It's time to have fun now. You know you've done all of your inner work and you've got all that stuff reconciled. Go have fun!" And she was right. But it wasn't anything that hadn't been said to me in the past, which made it really amusing and also lightened me up a whole lot.
MWL: That's interesting. Another thing I wanted to ask you about the new album. I have a copy of Frances Black's new album, Talk to Me, and I noticed that four of the songs from your new album you very generously offered to her. That's unusual to have new material that you are about record and release offered to another artist for nearly simultaneous release. But you've said that she really reinforced your belief in yourself as a songwriter?
NG: She really did. Her sister, Mary, had always been very supportive of me. And when Frances called doing a solo album she said, "Do you have some new songs that maybe Mary hasn't heard that I could hear? I'd like to do some songs of yours. You've been an inspiration to me. But I want songs that nobody's heard yet." And I said, "Well, I've got some new songs, Frances, but I've gone in a new direction in writing. They're so personal I don't know if you'll like them." And she actually recorded six, but just released the four.
MWL: What were the two she didn't release?
NG: "Don't Forget About Me" and, um . . . I can't remember (laughs).
MWL: But were they both songs that you also included on your album?
NG: Right, yeah.
MWL: Was "Don't Forget About Me" written for anybody in particular?
NG: No. It was just an explanation of how important people are to me . . . and to James Hooker, we co-wrote that one at a day of rehearsal. We were talking about our friend Bird Burton[???], a founding member of the Amazing Rhythm Aces and was in my band for four years. Bird's wife had just died. James and I were just speaking about Bird and how important people are to us, and we wrote that song.
MWL: You've worked with a lot of different producers in the past, in particular Jim Rooney. I thought your choice of producers were very good, but interesting, for this new album, do you plan to continue to experimenting with different things on future albums with different producers as well?
NG: Oh, I hope so. I hope to work with Peter Collins again. Peter Buck from R.E.M. was magnificent to work with, but Peter Collins was just such a magical producer to work with. He was like having Rod Argent, Glyn Johns, and Jim Rooney all rolled up into this one, multifaceted person. He's just incredibly interesting, has wonderful ideas, and is never pushy, does not inflict what he has in mind. He tells you what he has in mind or what he would like to see you try to do, and if you don't like it and you it, he doesn't throw some sort of tantrum and say, "You have to do it this way; I'm producing this album." He's just a brilliant guy. And yet he's not a producer who doesn't do anything. You know, some producers are good because they don't do anything. Peter's not one of them.
MWL: Are you planning to participate in that again in the future in your own production?
NG: I don't know. I mean it's been four albums now since I've produced Nanci Griffith and I'm not sure that I ever want to again. If I did, it would be something very stark. If I ever decided to just go in and do just a guitar, vocals, and keyboard album, I would go in and do it myself.
MWL: Do you think this new album has more elements that will appeal to a wider audience?
NG: Gosh, I don't know.
MWL: How about radio?
NG: I don't know. You know, I've never worried about it. Because I've never had it, I've never worried about it. If it does, that's great; and, if it doesn't, I'm just as happy as can be. It doesn't matter.
MWL: How would you feel about becoming a mega-superstar?
NG: Well, that'll never happen with me. Personally, I would never accept that. I mean it may happen outwardly and if my music were to reach that many people I would be elated but as far as myself considering myself that and accepting myself as that, that would never happen.
MWL: I wouldn't be surprised if this album happened to be like The Nick of Time for Bonnie Raitt even though this is your eleventh and not your tenth album and just went wild.
NG: It would [be] great, you know. The most important thing for me, my goal from childhood on, is to be a really good songwriter. That stamp of validation for that goal in life comes to me every time someone records one of my songs and every time someone sings one of my songs and every time someone takes one of my songs on as a companion. And so, if it happens that I should have my own hit of one of my own songs, that would be great. But for me the most fulfilling thing is always that validation of the dream and the goal that you had in life to begin with.
MWL: I wanted to tell you about something that a young, up-and-coming folkie from Boston said about you. Her name is Dar Williams and she made a big splash at the Folk Alliance conference in Boston this past winter. Have you heard of her yet?
NG: I've heard her name.
MWL: Well, I interviewed several other artists for this article and asked them about you. Here's what Dar Williams had to say: "I agree with your assessment that Nanci's lyrics are rooted in literature, specifically insofar as they reflect the human condition and the poignancy of individual passions and choices. Even more strongly, however, I see her as a character in literature, always staying true to her vision and her fellow artists in a way that's been a model for the rest of us."
NG: Wow! That brought tears to my eyes. Well, hopefully I've done that. I mean that's been my goal in life. I think that's something that comes from years of not expecting music to be anything more than the love of your life. That's something that I wouldn't expect a young person to think of, but that's really touching.
MWL: It's been almost twenty-six years (this Thanksgiving) since you played the Red Lion in Austin, your first professional gig. I wonder what you were hoping to achieve back then, was this what you wanted to achieve then, and have your expectations been reached, surpassed, or fallen short?
NG: My expectations have been far surpassed from what I ever expected to achieve in life. I just feel like the bonuses that I have gotten from the dreams that I set for myself have been extraordinary. It's far more than I expected that Thanksgiving evening when I went in to play the Red Lion at the age of fourteen.
MWL: You have worked with so many people so many brilliant artists. And so many of them are friends of yours, and you have friends in every genre I think. Is there anybody that you can think of in particular that you haven't worked with that you'd like to? Or have you met them yet?
NG: Oh, there are so many people that I'd love to work with. But one person in particular and we really wanted him to work on this album, I couldn't hear anybody else's voice working on it we really wanted Bono to come in and work on "Talk to Me While I'm Listening." You know he'd planned on it and then things happened in Dublin and he just could not do it. So Adam Duritz from Counting Crows sang the harmony. It was so interesting because he made it his harmony, Adam did. But I would still like to work with Bono someday, but things just happen the way they should. I mean things always seem to happen the way they should.
MWL: The other one that you did with him, "Going Back to Georgia," is really pretty, too.
NG: Thank you. Adam did a great job.
MWL: He did. This is probably a ridiculous question, but do you feel you've sacrificed personal relationships in order to fulfill your role as an artist?
NG: No, I think I did that personally to myself. I have so many dear friends who have great relationships and great careers, so it's not something that I've given up because I wanted to be successful.
MWL: How do you think your songwriting has changed over the years? I know you've said with this album, in particular, that you're writing more personally from the inside. Not strictly from a philosophical standpoint or a technical one, but overall how has your songwriting changed over the years?
NG: Gosh, I don't know. It would be hard for me to objectively see it change. You know, if I go back and listen to really early albums, I feel like maybe there's a change. But, at the same time, I know just a few weeks ago on the anniversary of Marilyn Monroe's death, the band and myself worked up "Marilyn Monroe/Neon & Waltzes" from Poet in My Window. It was like it had been in the set all along. It was like it had always been played. So I guess that I really haven't changed that drastically, because it felt like Nanci Griffith music. It didn't feel like Nanci Griffith twelve years ago.
MWL: I know you have a lot of literary interests as well. So aside from your music, you are a writer. You've written a couple of novels and lots of shorts stories. Thus far neither of your novels has been published. I've heard that you are particularly interested in finding an editor with whom you could work and have a relationship that would be reminiscent of the author/editor relationships that such novelists as Eudora Welty and William Faulkner had earlier in this century.
NG: I would, yeah. There are just so few genius, brilliant editors right now in contemporary fiction. It would be a blessing to find my own Maxwell Perkins in one of the publishing houses. I've come really close. Publishing houses are just like record labels. I've had the misfortune of getting close to getting a publishing deal for a book and an editor that I like, and then that editor will leave that publishing house. Or the whole regime will change over and they get fired, and then you're starting all over again. Hopefully, one day I will. I know that the books will come out eventually. I mean I believe in them and still very much like them. And if I can still read them, I think they're readable.
MWL: Where do you feel your art is best expressed? Do you still feel you're best as a songwriter, musician?
NG: I think that I still feel more confident as a songwriter. I know that I'm a good guitar player, and I rarely talk about playing my instrument and the time I spend learning new things, but that's one of the sides of me that people rarely see the musician side.
MWL: It was your guitar playing that got you to be a songwriter, isn't it? You couldn't play other people's music.
NG: No, I couldn't.
MWL: How have you felt about the size and makeup of your audience? It's pretty varied. There are so many different kinds of people that I have seen following you. Would you like to reach out other people. Is there any group in particular?
NG: No. I feel like they're all represented. They're very well represented. Everything from young kids to teenagers, all the way up to people my parents age. I feel very fortunate, because I'd hate to be just playing for my peers. It's the same thing as trying to figure out why Larry Mullen, Jr., is at the same show that Odetta comes to. I feel really lucky to draw so many different kinds of people.
MWL: So your audience is as varied as your circle of friends?
NG: It is, yeah. MWL: You have many references in your writing to the winter. The winter is often represented as something harsh and something you are alone in, or it is something you take solace in having companionship through I know that many of these are fictional so your characters are comforted in having someone with them in the winter. I just wondered if you have a hard time in the winter with depression?
NG: No, not really. Because I've always thrived in really dark things. The winter is a very dark time. Not so much where I come from in Texas, but when you get over to Europe like in Northern Scotland or Northern Ireland where it gets dark by 3:30 in the afternoon it's just a dark time.
MWL: A lot of these songs were written when you lived in New England. I thought perhaps being a Texas woman, you had a hard time adjusting to the winter. But you like it, huh?
NG: I do like it, yeah.
MWL: One of the nicest things that I think you've said about winter is in "Banks of Pontchartrain" you say "when the wintertime speaks softly in the falling rain." I heard in an introduction to that song once that your cousin Libby, who is mentioned in the song, owns a chain of sandwich shops in New Orleans.
NG: She did, yeah. She lives in Atlanta now teaching school.
MWL: Well, I think I'm just about through with all that I had to ask you. And I know you're going to be glad that you're done you've had a long day.
NG: Well, I appreciate your patience.
MWL: I really appreciate your giving me your time. I wanted to ask you one thing about your tour schedule. You're promoting this first in Europe, then taking a break, and then you're starting here in January.
NG: That's right. When we get back from Europe we're doing a week on Broadway in New York. I'll go back to Ireland for a week at Christmas. Then I'll come back and we'll start touring the end of January.
MWL: Is there any particular reason you decided to tour there first?
NG: No. It just worked out that way. The Royal Albert Hall is difficult to book. And they stay booked so far in advance. Those dates at the Royal Albert Hall, the three nights there, have been booked for quite a while.
MWL: Thank you very much. Good luck with this album. And I hope you tour for another fifty years.
NG: Thank you.