Street roots., September 28, 2012, Page 5, Image 5

MERCHANT, fro m page 1
that there was no thimerosal, or
preservatives of that nature, in the vaccines.
S.Z.: You come from working class roots,
can you talk a bit about your childhood and
how those experiences have influenced your
work, your career and your life?
heard about them through the research that
I am doing about fracking. Within a half mile
of three schools, there were plans for eight
fracking wells. They fought it desperately,
for years.
The fracking began in August. They lost.
These women were sobbing, they said, “Our
kids are sick, we’re sick, our properties are
worthless.” One woman said, “Even if I
N.M.: I grew up in a small town, in the
rustbelt in the Northeast. I grew up with a
sense that things were in decline. I’m sure
that affected my world view which then
affected the things that I chose to write
about. By the time I was cognisant of the
world, we were deep into a recession in the
'70s and the area where I grew up never
really recovered.
We were a very close-knit, Italian family.
Italian was spoken by all of my older
relatives and we kept a lot of the traditions
of the small village where they came from
alive. We were raised Roman Catholic so
there was a sense of tradition and family.
That was really wonderful.
And then I also spent lots of time in
nature — really unsupervised time in nature.
I spent so much time in the woods and the
forest. I had my own garden from the time I
was 10. In second and third grades, I had a
wonderful, really inspiring, elementary
school music teacher who would teach me
folk music and I fell in love.
N.M.: Well, physically is part of it. You
can’t deny that we are a culture that really
worships youth. We can’t ignore that. Some
people remain vital by doing the same thing
over and over. And there is definitely a
market for that. People want to see you -
it’s like they want to go to McDonalds and
eat the same hamburger that they ate 40
years ago. But I would say that the only way
you can remain vital is to keep learning and
expanding and changing.
I acknowledge that I have contributed a
little something to popular culture and it’s
pretty thrilling. I’ve written a couple of
songs that when people hear them on the
radio, they feel good and they sing along.
I’ve become sort of woven into the fabric of
the culture and into people’s lives. When
people tell me, “‘Kind and Generous’ was
played at my wedding when I danced with
my father,” it makes me want to cry. It’s
really beautiful. There is a type of
endurance in that too.
N.M.: No, that’s not true at all. I went
Advanced Placement to college when I was
16. There is quite a difference between
dropping out and starting your freshman
year at college.
I was precociously mature. When I was 12
my mother said I acted like I was 3 0 .1 went
to them at 15 and said my plan was to go to
college the next year my parents were like,
what’s your rush? These are the best years
of your life. I didn’t really feel like I was
flourishing in a high school environment.
S.Z.: Your music has been influential to a
wide range of people. Aileen Wuomos was the
10th woman to be executed in the United
States. She requested that your song, Carnival,
be played at her funeral. How did/do you feel
about this?
S.Z.: It was about this time that you became
a member o f10,000 Maniacs. What is the most
valued experience you came away with from
your time in the band?
S.Z.: Switching topics a bit to the
environmental: Fracking is an important issue
in your ethos. Why is it important to you?
N.M.: Well, New York has been trying to
halt the progression of hydraulic fracturing
in our state for four years through an
amazing grassroots resistance. We have rich
deposits of natural gas here because we are
on the Marcellus Shale (a unit of marine
sedimentary rock found in eastern North
America that contains largely untapped
natural gas reserves). We have seen what
has happened in Ohio and in West Virginia
and our nearest neighbors, Pennsylvania.
We’ve seen the industrialization of rural
regions and the introduction of toxic
chemicals to water systems.
I’ve lived in rural New York for nearly 50
years - my entire life. This is my world. This
is my home. So, I learned about hydraulic
fracturing. It is such an extreme and
dangerous form of extraction for natural gas.
Look - half the country lives in severe
drought right now. Failure of crops and all of
the things that we’ve been warned about,
are beginning to happen. Why would we get
deeper into our addiction to fossil fuels
when this is our last moment to make some
effort to transition into some alternatives?
It’s madness.
Regions of Colorado have been
devastated. Wells County has 18 thousand
wells in one county. I did a benefit for a
group of women called Erie Rising. They
wrote me a letter, asking me if I would come
and do a benefit for them. I had already
they screamed the sentence back to me.
And I screamed, “What did Edward Lear
write?” And they all screamed back, “Calico
Pie!” And we played “Calico Pie” and they
all sang along. It was so moving. It was hard
to stay focused on what I was doing. I
couldn’t believe the level of ecstasy in that
room over a Victorian poet. If you go to my
website, there is actually a film that shares
the experience. And one of the girls says, “It
was the best day of my life.” I think my
future is in music education.
S.Z.: How does one age gracefully in the
music industry? I don’t mean on a physical
level. I mean in terms of sustainability,
endurance and presence, creatively.
S.Z.: You mentioned that you were
disenchanted with school bureaucracy. I read
that you dropped out of school at age 16. Is
that true?
N.M.: (Long pause) I didn’t anticipate that
I would have a career in music. I just
thought that being in a band was something
interesting and it was a fun, creative outlet.
So I guess the thing I learned was how to be
a musician.
orchestras. We’ve been approaching the
orchestras of all cities in America about
there being a program for children where I
come in and take the songs apart, and take
the poetry apart and reconstruct it with
musicians in the room: a real harp player, a
real bassoon player and a real string quartet.
That’s a pretty rare opportunity for children
to be in a room with symphonic instruments
could sell my home, it would be morally
unjust.” She didn’t want anyone else to have
to go through what they were going through.
They are just trapped.
I’m really not feeling “causey” in an
ephemeral way. This really matters. This my
life, it is my home that I’m trying to defend.
S.Z.: Let’s talk about motherhood. You have
said that children have a much larger capacity
for feeling than we give them credit for - a
realization that came to you as you went
through the process of creating “Leave Your
Sleep, ” an album released in spring 2010 for
your daughter who was born in 2003. What
other revelations have you had in the role of
mother?
N.M.: That it is so important to speak to
children as humans from the time that they
are really young. I feel that people speak to
children like they are objects or that they
don’t notice things. Children notice
everything. They are so sensitive. They are
so aware and very sophisticated. I don’t
mean that they know how to run an iPad. I
mean sophisticated in an emotional and
intellectual way. They are forming a vision of
the world all the time.
S.Z.: “Leave Your Sleep” was a project that
included 27 songs, 130 musicians and took
over five years to complete. Have you plans to
tackle a project of this enormity again?,
N.M.: No. Well, actually I do have plans to
tackle something that isn’t quite as
enormous. What I would like to make is a
website that is a database for American
balladry and folk craft.
Also, the “Leave Your Sleep” album was
turned into a picture book and that has been
really fun. That will come out in November.
I’m also doing these performances with
N.M.: I didn’t find out that until there was
a documentary being made about her life.
To tell the truth, requests came in for
several months for the use of the song in
the movie, and I said no. I didn’t really want
to be connected to her. The director (of the
documentary) wrote and said, “Well actually,
it’s not that I just want to use your song, it’s
P H O T O B Y M A R IO N E T T L IN G E R
that you were part of her life.” It was a little
and pause and say, let’s examine what the
mortifying. At the same time, I thought, she
clarinet and the flute are doing here. We
did lead a really tortured life and my music
would also talk about the process of
brought her some solace, or peace. She
adaptation and have the poems turn into
must have felt very strongly about it because
music before their eyes. I’m in the process
she knew she was going to die and my song
of developing the presentation.
was what she wanted played at her funeral.
That’s when I
S.Z.: How
allowed him to use
important is that oral
the song in his
tradition for you?
documentary. You
^Children
notice
everything
?
make the music and
N.M.: I did this
they
are
so
sensitive«
They
because of the nature
amazing collaboration
of the technology, it
with the 92nd Street
are so aware and very
goes out there into
YMCA last year, and
sophisticated, I donrt mean
the world and you
they had almost 4,000
that
they
fcnow
how
t©
ran
an
don’t have any
schoolchildren in New
IPad, I mean sophisticated la control over it or
York between the
who responds to it or
ages of five and nine.
an emotional and
how they respond to
They studied a unit of
intellectual
way.
They
are
it.
poetry and music
form
ing
a
vision
of
the
world
based on “Leave Your
S.Z.: When you
Sleep.” Then I went
a ll the tint® "
think about the future
and gave a free
of the world, what
concert and the kids
hopes do you have
were all bused in over
specifically for your
the course of a few
daughter and in general for humanity?
days. It was astounding to have 800 New
York City schoolkids in the audience at a
N.M.: (Long pause) I hope there is some
time. And at least a quarter of them came
kind of spiritual revolution. I hope for that
from households where English was not
worldwide epiphany where people realize
their first language, a very multi-ethnic
how precious their lives are. I think all the
community. And they were screaming for
change will come from that. But until we
Edward Lear (a British artist and poet who
really realize what a miracle it is that we
is featured on “Leave Your Sleep” and who
even exist - all our petty disputes and all of
familiarized the limerick and literary
our selfish pursuits — everything will
perpetuate and we’re going to kill ourselves
nonsense).
I shared a photograph of Edward Lear and off. I really believe that the arts, if not
I would say (Merchant speaks as though she
religion then the arts, are the second hope
is cheering over a crowd of 800 students),
for reaching people — to appreciate the
“Who’s that?” They’d say, “Edward Lear.”
beauty that we can create and share.
And I’d say, “What does Edward Lear have
sue@streetroots. org
on his face?” And they’d scream, “A Beard!”
And I’d say, “Edward Lear’s beard!” And