Dar Williams: The Beauty of Living

By Jason A. Killingsworth
 
Paste Magazine, Issue 3, January  2003
Critics adore her work. Club-owners appreciate the way she effortlessly sells-out their venues. Amateur songwriters mop up drool while enjoying her richly layered musical narratives. A new generation of pop-folk enthusiasts lauds her as one of the genre’s central figures. I, on the other hand, am simply a fan/writer who was lucky enough to score an advance copy of her new album as well as a 45-minute phone interview.

Dar Williams' fifth studio project, The Beauty of the Rain, will be released February 18 on Razor & Tie Records and will build upon an already impressive body of work. In Rain’s second track, “Farewell to the Old Me,” a song written for Lisa Kors’ film Dinner and a Movie, she sings, “My life is working better now / Always changing anyhow.”

This line appears strangely autobiographical; in a little over a year, Williams got married, relocated to New York City from Massachusetts, authored a young-adult novel for Scholastic Publishing (to be released this year), and found time to record the most ambitious album of her career. Getting married hasn’t hampered her creativity in the least.

“My husband has been the person who’s facilitated the writing, as opposed to if he was a badboy who came in and gave me a lot to write about.” Williams takes a moment to applaud his taste in music, adding, “He’s offered me a pretty harmonious lifestyle and I’m very grateful for that. He offers me a certain amount of peace and security. And he’s a really good cook.”

Talking to Williams you sense the maturity of someone who has worked long and hard to achieve her fame. After all, her career spans more than a decade, winding back to the Boston coffeehouse scene of the early 90s where she began showcasing her music after graduating from college. That schooling at Wesleyan University in Connecticut, where she earned a B.A. in religion and theater, would provide her with a complex understanding of people’s quest for meaning as well as a deep appreciation for the varied art of story-telling itself.

Discussing her thoughts on coming to grips with fame, Williams reaches way back into her senior thesis—a play with an accompanying essay—for an appropriate metaphor. “So the metaphor that I explored was lightning. Heat lightning illuminates the landscape. And a bolt of lightning, if you have gradually built up enough inner electricity to receive that electricity, then you can handle it. But if you’ve never experienced anything like it, nor do you have any practice to receive it, it can kill you … I’ve been hit by little bolts here and there, sometimes they’re painful and sometimes they’re not.”

Another important aspect of fame, according to Williams, is the responsible use of the influence it affords: “I think that basically I try and figure out how I can use my voice to promote certain causes without being a complete drone.” Williams has already used that voice to speak out on topics she feels strongly about, primarily environmental awareness.

In the course of our conversation, she also expresses her stupefaction (“I mean, what the hell?”) with how many schools have decided to abandon music programs for young students, in light of economic prosperity and reputable studies linking music and learning. While she hasn’t yet joined the fray where this particular issue is concerned, she’s not afraid to break radio silence when it comes time to question the powers that be. “I think it’s healthy when there’s a build-up of silence for someone to say to a crowd, ‘By the way, I noticed this, and I know you did too.’”

While the songs on her 2001 release, The Green World, tackled much broader, universal subjects such as the role of religion and nature in our lives, The Beauty of the Rain engages the listener in what Williams refers to as “smaller conversations.” Due to its narrowed scope the new album feels both intimate and, at the same time, highly accessible.

Not to mention the roster of distinguished musicians featured on this new disc, which reads like a guest list at the door of some industry gathering—Alison Krauss, Bela Fleck, John Popper (Blues Traveler), Stefan Lessard (Dave Matthews Band), John Medeski (Medeski, Martin, & Wood), Chris Botti (Sting), Cliff Eberhardt, Michael Kang (String Cheese Incident), Stuart Smith (Eagles). The convergence of such musical genius on this project speaks to Williams’ broadening influence.

In regard to the origin of these collaborations, Williams credits her manager’s two sons, Brad and Matt, for introducing their dad to “this whole world of incredible musicians” that are carrying on the tradition of jam band collaboration. From there it was just a matter of placing several phone calls and arranging how to get each person into the studio. “You have a blank canvas,” she observes. “I can ask whomever I want unless, of course, I wanted to play all the instruments myself which would be, you know, a tragedy. Why not showcase these very eager young musicians?” Why not, indeed? Especially when the resulting canvas, fully adorned, is nothing short of awe-inspiring.

While none would question Williams’ musicianship, she’s taking guitar lessons again for the first time in 10 years. “You know, you sit there going, ‘Am I an impostor? Am I an impostor? Well, if you are, you’re a damn lucky impostor so why don’t you go ahead and become the real thing before anybody finds out’ … so, yeah, I’m finally moving up the fret board a little bit.” After acknowledging the fact that she’s been playing guitar since early childhood, she quips, “You know how they say, ‘You throw like a girl’? Well, ok, I won’t say anything more than that.”

After hearing statements like these I find myself wishing that her recent children’s novel had instead been a How-To on maintaining a right perspective on living; her optimistic view of life and art so enjoyably refreshing. Williams describes a moment of clarity that took place near the end of working on her new album.

Worn down from long, grueling hours spent mixing The Beauty of the Rain, she had staggered out onto the balcony of her motel room overlooking the swimming pool. “I was thinking, ‘God, I have all this stuff to do. What do I do? Why didn’t I get through my list yesterday? Why didn’t I get through my list of things to do the day before?’” At this point she noticed another person who had been involved in the mixing process, down below, walking slowly up to the edge of the swimming pool.

“He looked at the pool, he knew it was cold, he had a look of resignation on his face, and he just plopped in … and I thought, ‘Oh, I know what I was doing all this time. I was having fun!’ The bridge between virtuosity and who you are in terms of those moments that aren’t defined by brilliance and climaxes is the ability to experience fun and to notice something before it disappears.”

Given the considerable level of notoriety Williams enjoys at this point in her career, her feet remain firmly planted on the earth. “I can’t change everything,” she confides, “but I have actual power that I can use to make the world a more beautiful place. Who ever said I had to save the world anyway? And isn’t it nice to be saved once in a while? When you face that intimacy of yourself as an individual on this fabulous planet, it can really free you up.”

Visit his blog at: http://www.jasonkill.com