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wendy starland interview |
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commentary
by peter quinones
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22 may 2006 |
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special
assignment | volume 1 •
number 1
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"Every
human is an artist. And this is the main art that we have:
the creation of our story." -Don Miguel Ruiz
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since May 2006 | Special Assignment is a series of artists'
profiles, events spotlights, and interviews. |
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Peter
Quinones
(eMail • Web
site), a resident of Brooklyn,
New
York, is currently working on a book about contemporary literature
and its relationship to the culture as a whole. Several notable
authors, interviewed by Peter for The Bohemian Aesthetic,
are assisting him with that project.
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I first met Wendy
Starland a couple of years ago, when we were introduced by a mutual
acquaintance, guitarist Oz
Noy. In that short time, the amount of progress she's made on the
way to stardom is amazing. Recently, I caught her performance at an
International Songwriters Hall of Fame event and, a few days later,
we're sitting down to discuss what's happening with her seemingly inexhaustible
roster of projects.
As we walk along Broadway, on the Upper West Side, a woman stops us,
asking Wendy, "Who are you? Are you a movie star?" Wendy laughs
it off, but that's definitely what she projects. Deesh
Clothing, one of the hippest contemporary lines, thinks so too;
not only have they used Starland's music in their ads, they've also
used her as a model. Then, there's Hollywood; her song "Stolen
Love", a ballad about some dear friends she lost in the tragedy
of 9/11, has been signed as the theme song for the upcoming Living
the Lie, with Cameron
Diaz and Jon
Bon Jovi. Nomad Films producer David-Michael
Petragnani has approached her about being a music supervisor for
his upcoming film called Swipe, and Daniel
Bigel—producer of such pictures as Two
Girls and a Guy, Harvard
Man, Black
and White, and Empire—is
also after her tunes for a film.
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So,
what can she do for an encore?
I ask, as we slide right up against the front window of the
coffee shop and into a booth that's splashed with sunshine.
It's one of the first really nice days of spring and there's
a feeling of carefree release in the air. Thousands of people
line the streets. "Did I understand that one of the songs
you did at the Hall of Fame show is being released in Europe?"
"Dancing with the Sea." She orders a grapefruit and
I go for the turkey burger. "Universal's releasing it as
a single on a compilation with songs by Shawn
Colvin, Edie
Brickell, and Katie
Melua."
I noticed in the program guide that that tune was co-written
with Jack
Livesey. "When you co-write a song, does one write
the words and the other the music, or do both of you work on
both? How does that work?"
She says that she'll write the lyrics to 99 per cent of her
songs but that she likes to write music with Livesey because
"he can finish my musical sentences beautifully. Collaboration
like that is an incredible process. It's like falling in love—so
fresh and unexpected."
Wendy's deep appreciation for the craft of songwriting is something
she combines in her tunes with an uncanny production savvy (for
example, the way words are whispered under their sung counterparts
in "Garden
of Temptation"). She speaks a bit about some of her
heroes and influences.
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Sting:
"For me, he is the ultimate. He approaches music from an
intellectual standpoint. For example, using different time signatures
in one song. I love how he combines rock, pop, world and jazz
music seamlessly. He's a genius." |
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Carole
King: "She's just an incredible songwriter, worthy
of so much respect. I'm floored by her songwriting ability. And
she proved that she could write great songs not only for herself,
like on Tapestry, but for so many others, too. She has
a real love for the process, not just for the glory." |
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Seal:
"I'm really into voice textures and Seal has so many levels.
His ethereal kind of music, with such specific melodic lines...there's
so much passion and bravery in his music." |
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Annie
Lennox: "A white girl with soul! I love her because
she embraces the depth in her voice; she's not worried about showing
how high she can sing. Her music is so original, it's not straight-ahead
anything." |
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I mention that
the songwriting partnership with Livesey must be very satisfying. (Livesey's
a principal in Duotone
Audio Group in New York, a major hub for composers, producers and
songwriters.) The waiter stares a little; I wonder if he's wondering
if he saw Wendy singing "Amazing Grace" on "The Apprentice",
as millions of other viewers did. (She didn't get to meet Trump.)
We talk some about how she likes helping out fellow songwriters and
performers, a case in point being Stefani
Germanotta, who wowed the crowd at the same Hall of Fame event mentioned
earlier. Starland was so impressed with Germanotta that she practically
grabbed her by the wrist and dragged her to the phone to speak to Rob
Fusari, another composer with whom Wendy collaborates. Fusari's
written and produced number one hits with Destiny's Child and Will Smith
and is always on the lookout for talented newcomers. "He couldn't
be there that night, but he asked to keep an eye out for somebody who
had the ability and the desire, and that's definitely Stefani,"
Starland says.
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Starland
in live performance
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Perhaps
the biggest influence of all, on Starland, has been international
superstar Sting, who was so impressed with her that they've
had two private meetings to talk about life and music. A Sting
colleague, producer Hugh
Padgham—arguably one of the three or four most influential
producers in music over the last few decades—flew in
from London just to hear Starland perform live. One scheduled
appointment with Sting became a near disaster when Starland
fell and broke her ankle on the way and couldn't make it in
time. She was unable to make that up for many months.
We run out of time before we can discuss much more, and there's
a lot more in her career that isn't discussed here.
I have to go and Wendy's off to shop for a couple of chandeliers.
Before, of course, working all night on composing and recording,
once again. This is the kind of dedication that always bears
fruit. Starland's road to success, in an incredibly hard field
of endeavor (which all began, by the way, when she was in
school attending a Maceo
Parker concert and he pulled her up out of the audience
to come onstage), is certainly a great model for anyone chasing
down a dream.
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Aesthetic or its founder. All materials appearing on this Web
site are copyrights of patsymooreDOTcom, respective authors,
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