These Days

In a 1984 interview with Rolling Stone, Bob Dylan remarked that a folksinger singing his own songs-"that's not a folk singer." With her Grammy-winning 1993 Other Voices, Other Rooms collection and its just releasedsequel, Other Voices, Too: A Trip Back to Bountiful, Texas,"folkabilly" singer/songwriter Nanci Griffith has taken that sentiment toheart. Both albums collect some of the most enduring songs of the modern eraby writers ranging from Pete Seeger and Dylan to Guy Clark and Sandy Denny. OnOther Voices, Too, Griffith frequently steps into the background toallow the dozens of guest artists to take center stage. The result is averitable who's who of modern folk, as star-studded as the fourteen-dateNewport Folk Festival National Tour Griffith is currently travelling thecountry with.

Other Voices, Too is Griffith's fifteenth album, and for the forseeablefuture, her last. When the Newport tour wraps up in Los Angeles on September20, she plans to semi-retire from music to pursue a literary career. Her firstbook (co-written with journalist Joe Jackson), Other Voices ... A PersonalHistory of Folk Music, is due September 14 from Random House. Packed withGriffith's notes on her career and interviews with several of her heroes, it'sa fitting bookend to the first phase of her storied career.

You collaborated with a lot of your inspirational idols on Other Voices,Too. What was it like for you to record with, say, Richard Thompson? Wereyou ever intimidated by him?

You know, he no longer really intimidates me. It was such a pleasure-he intimidates my drummer Pat McInerney, because Pat just worships the ground Richard Thompson walks on. We could never have done "You Were On My Mind" without Richard's guitar-that big, tall, jangly Richard Thompson guitar.And he's just an amazing person. Delightful. You never see the man without asmile and a wink in the eye.

As someone who gets so much joy out of covering other people's songs, howdid it feel when two of your peers and heroes, Willie Nelson and EmmylouHarris recorded your own "Gulf Coast Highway"?

I *loved* it, and I loved their version of it. It's funny because I was doing a fundraiser for Ann Richards when she was still the governor of Texas with Willie, and Willie said, "Will you do 'Gulf Coast Highway' with me because I never get to do it unless Emmy's around." But Willie doesn't like to rehearse.And there's an instrumental thing in the middle of it, and we came to it, andwe both looked at each other and we both realized that we played itdifferently (laughs). And Willie was like, 'You take it.' It was like ChetAtkins making me play the lead part on 'Are You Tired of Me My Darlin' on thefirst volume Other Voices. I was like, 'Yeah right!' (laughs)

You've recorded and toured with the Chieftains frequently, but you bowedout of a Chieftains tour last year when Ashley MacIsaac was added to the bill,supposedly trimming your stage time. What was behind that episode?

For one thing, I was going through breast cancer at the time, and I was goingthrough radiation treatment and I was not going to work at all, and[Chieftain] Paddy Moloney had asked me to do this month long tour with him. Inever met Ashley MacIsaac. We were getting complaints from promoters whom Ihad been devoted to for years because Paddy Moloney had kept cutting back mytime so that he could showcase this artist that he had a piece of. The rest ofthe Chieftains are like brothers to me. I love them dearly. But I was gettingso many complaints, and promoters threatening to sue me because they were notgetting the time that was on the contracts, and I just really did not needthat conflict in my life at that time, and I was calling my sister-in-armsEmmylou Harris every night in tears. And she said, 'You know Nanci, sometimesyou just have to bite the bullet, pack up your team, take your ball and gohome.'

And that's what I did. And the next thing I know, I'm reading this bull---- that Paddy Moloney had put out through his publicist, creating some kind of controversy between Ashley MacIsaac and myself. And you can imagine how I felt sitting in a hospital going through radiation treatment, reading this stuff and refusing to dignify it by making a statement. My support of other artists has been endless throughout my career, and I would never do anything to a young artist-I like Ashley's music, but that whole thing about the arguments ... I never met the man. He was not on the bill to begin with and not on the contract, and that was the problem. It was a legal problem, and it was a problem between myself and Paddy Moloney that will never be resolved.What he did to me, I think, it was beyond abuse-it was malicious andslanderous. And I don't mind speaking out about it now.

How are you doing now in terms of the breast cancer?

I'm fine. I've got it beat for the time being. It may be something that Ihave to face again in life, but my dad beat cancer fifteen years ago, and Ibeat it too. We're fighters.

So is it true Other Voices, Too is going to be your lastalbum?

It is, yeah. For a while. I really would like to take a five-year break and doother things. The Nashville Ballet Company put together a contemporary ballet["This Heart," based on Griffith's songs] that is just a gorgeous ballet andwe are planning on taking that to other symphonies and companies in '99. TheBlue Moon Orchestra and I are in the pit. It's a real challenge for me becauseyou've got to play by the books. You've got to play those songs by the chartsor you're going to leave some dancer up in the air. It's an exact, heartfeltexperience. And I really want five years to just enjoy these things andexplore these avenues.

So this retirement doesn't necessarily mean that we'll never hear yourecord again?

No. I'll write and I'll watch. The eclectic songs that the great singers won'ttake a chance on, I'll want them to be heard. So I'm sure there will be otherrecords, but not for a while.

Tell me a bit about your Personal History of Folk Music book.

It's a really fun book because it's basically a series of interviews with allof these artists. Pete Seeger is the coda on the book, and it was the firsttime for Pete to go in-depth about what it was like to be black-listed in theFifties. And there's a lot of great, funny stories. I think that people willenjoy it because you never really know what goes on in sessions, especially ina hootenanny like this where you've got thirty-seven people gathered around amicrophone to sing "Wasn't That a Mighty Storm."

I had said that I'll never do another volume of Other Voices, Other Rooms, because it's so painful trying to get all these people together in one room at one time. And it's hard to get them to leave! You say, "Jerry Jeff, you've got to get out of here, you've got a plane to catch," and he's like, "No, I want to stay..." and you've got to say "No! You're outta here!"It's great fun, but it's like childbirth-you forget how painful it was.

RICHARD SKANSE