When you hear Ann Hampton Callaway sing pages from the Great American Songbook you know that you're hearing one of the loveliest voices on the planet interpret the work of Gershwin, Porter, Mercer and Kern. But did you know she is a prolific songwriter as well? She has usually included one or two of her own songs on her various albums over the years, but now she offers us Finding Beauty: Originals, Vol. 1. She's not alone on this project, either. Listen for the incredibly talented singers with whom she's collaborating, and the inspiration behind these beautiful songs. (Spoiler alert: not all the inspiration comes from this world.)
Listen to our conversation, above.
Interview transcript:
Brian Delp: It's a great pleasure for us to have you here to talk about your tremendous new album. I was just listening to it this morning. Finding Beauty: Originals, Volume 1. After having seen you numerous times celebrate the Great American Song Book, why now would you do this record of just your songs, admittedly with a variety of guests? You’ve always been a remarkable songwriter. The list of people doing your songs is unbelievable. From Barbra Streisand to Liza Minnelli to Karrin Allyson to so many others.
Ann Hampton Callaway: Well, most of my favorite singer songwriters would only do their own songs. The people inspired me to be a songwriter who I list as Joni Mitchell, Carole King, James Taylor, and then, George Gershwin's Rhapsody in Blue when I was seven. All the great writers. But most of the singer songwriters, when I was just really discovering that this is what I wanted to do with my life, only did their own songs. I thought it was always kind of strange that I didn't do more of my original songs.
During the pandemic, when this project began, I thought to myself, a lot of people are not with us anymore. We don't know what's going to happen tomorrow. And, like a great song, tomorrow may never come. But I thought, well, what is on my bucket list and what's at the top of it? Doing a record that is the most personal way of sharing how I see the world. What I've learned in my life, what matters to me, of all original songs was just the perfect expression of what I needed to do during the pandemic. It was a very rich, creative time when I wrote a poem every single day and shared it.
I was really trying to lift people's spirits up and I was trying to find the beauty of life despite all the chaotic uncertainty that we were living with. There are a lot of moments in this life, and I'm sure it will be ahead of us, where life feels very hard to believe in. There are so many things that are baffling.
This project began with a few singles, and it turned into an entire CD, the most songs I've ever recorded on one CD. I'm so happy that, over three years, I got to work with a genius team of Trey Henry and Paul Viapiano, who assembled a sonic universe to put my songs and bring them to life. Working with some of my favorite musicians and singers, it was a real dream come true on many levels.
Speaking of which, I was really struck by the musicians that you have on the recording, not just the incredible special guests that you have on various selections.
I got to work with Christian Jacob, who was on piano. Trey Henry is the bass player, Ray Brinker did the drums and Brian Kilgore did percussion. Paul Villapiano did the guitar. Then we had various guests to other beautiful sounds. We had some cello. We had beautiful sounds from their arranging too. It was the first time in my life that I got to work with people not in the room. The only time I got to be in the room with people was when I recorded my duet with Melissa Manchester when we were both in LA. It was the last song. So we were out and about, back in business, performing. It was great to have that experience. But I was amazed at how beautifully each song unfolded over the three years. It was so nice to work with Christian and see him in person and make that music that is so beautiful when you're together in the same room.
I'm sure it's not the only reason, but it explains why you recorded this wonderful song with Tierney Sutton, because basically that was her band that you were working with, right?
Well, I actually was on the road with Tierney Sutton, and I've worked with that band since the ‘90s whenever I'm on the West Coast, and she's not working with them. She gives me her blessing. She teases me about it, but yes, I think they are phenomenal musicians. Trey's arranging powers are exceptional, so it was a joy to work with them. Tierney and I did a show of songs from two albums about movies, that we toured around the country. It was quite a success. I love singing with her. Somehow when our voices blend it feels like two flutes that are dancing in the wind. It's just a wonderful musical experience.
You're appearing on this album with Tierney, with Kurt Elling, with Niki Haris, with Melissa Manchester, and with your own sister. What's the matter? You couldn't find anybody who could sing?
I know, that's what the beauty of the family that music makes. If you spend enough time with them, you get to make great friends. I have to credit The Jazz Cruise for deepening those friendships with everyone. I really got to spend so much more quality time with everyone. It was sort of like being in school where you see everybody every single day. You have meals with them and you hang out with them. It made the music come out even more beautifully because we've all been through so much together and shared so much and worked together and done shows together. It’s a very rich experience. I think when you have the love, then the music becomes more powerful.
Speaking of The Jazz Cruise, we just missed you this last January, as you were getting off when my wife Susan and I were getting on board the same ship for Blue Note at Sea.
That was the best jazz cruise ever. I’ve been on so many jazz cruises, but that one was so special because it was the first one that we were all together again. And so it was like, “Oh my God, there you are.” I got to make music with Samara Joy and it was a wonderful and inspiring time together.
Speaking of whom, you're seeing the cycle of great new singers come up now. Granted they've always been there, but all of a sudden you have people like Samara Joy and Veronica Swift. They’re coming up and realizing a new level of recognition to the public.
I'm so happy to see that. I think it gives us great hope. People say, what's happening in jazz? How is it going to continue? It's going to continue by great new talent. When Samara Joy won not only the last year's Grammy for Best Jazz Vocal Record, but also as the Best New Artist of the Year, I was ecstatic because I thought it shows that people have taste. That it's not just about who can wiggle their hips and sing some funky love song or rap it. Somebody who was a true artist. A young, brilliant, shining new star. It was so thrilling and to meet her in person and I had to follow her on The Jazz Cruise when she got a standing ovation. The only thing I could do to follow that was, after listening to the interviews with Shelley Berg of why all these singers on this stage were singing, I improvised a song about each one of them. And I got to celebrate each one of them. Then Dee Dee Bridgewater grabbed my mic and sang about me and it was hilarious.
I think it's so important to highlight and celebrate the new talent because they're bridging the old with the new. They're doing things that feel very fresh and meaningful. I'm so excited about both of those artists you mentioned.
But your artistry is still fresh and meaningful. We're hearing songs here that we've really never heard before. For instance, the one that you do with Kurt Elling is very touching, “Love and Let Love.” I listened to that and I thought, how wonderful this is, because if there's one thing we have a shortage of in the world these days, Is love. The fact is that the more love that we have and the more we express it for each other, the better off we're going to be.
That's why we're on this earth, in my opinion. We're living in a time where people are forgetting about that. A lot of this record is about that. There's my peace anthem that Barbra Streisand recorded called “At the Same Time.” I wrote it in 1987 when there was a World Peace Prayer called “The Harmonic Convergence.” I've seen this song being relevant in so many ways through the years, but now we've got more than two major wars going on in the world. It’s nice as an artist to be a citizen too and to speak to things that we're grappling with. Music has the power to bridge so many divides and hold us together in a way that nothing else does. I'm so happy that this record could allow some thinking about these subjects because I think they're extremely important in this lifetime.
Now let's talk about your process for a moment because I know you've been writing songs all your life practically. Basically, you take more or less five minutes to get your idea across, which frankly I think is perfect. How do you go about that? How do you approach writing a song from some fragment that just pops into your head?
It's a very interesting process each time. I will say that during the pandemic when I was writing a poem every single day, no matter how tired I was, no matter what I felt, I started to get this really beautiful flow of creative thinking going on. Every day were surprises I had no idea were inside of me. Some of those poems clearly needed music and some of them didn't. When I was doing that, I really felt like there was this real strong inspiration going on. When you have that feeling, it guides you, it moves you forward. It's like a tidal wave. You just follow the energy, the meaning, the word, the story, whatever needs to be said. I follow the wisdom of the great French poet, Paul Villard. He said, “Art is the collaboration between God and the artist, and the less the artist does, the better.”
Divine inspiration really helps, is that it?
It’s like a duet between effort and grace. For instance, I once wrote a song on an overheard line in a conversation, and I just lived with that for a moment. I'm like, “Well, all right, what's the story here?” And being an actress, not just a singer and songwriter, really helps me because I enter the world of the mindset of whoever I'm writing about or for. Like when I wrote Barbra Streisand's wedding song, which she wrote about in her memoir, I was just pretending, “I'm Barbra Streisand, I'm getting married, what do I need to say?” And I'd started to sort of conjure up this setting and this plot that unfolded. What do I want to say next? How does that make me feel? What are the contradictions there?
But if I start to write a melody, I have no idea what it's about. It could take me years. I wrote a title once, when I went to see Anne Frank's house, “Silent Footsteps.” Seven years later, I wrote the song in 14 minutes. I never know what the process will be, but I'm a very creative person. I've forced myself through the years since I was 12 years old and I read Bob Dylan's book, a free association novel called Tarantula. And I thought, “Oh my goodness, this is so exciting.” Doing free association writing in my journals through many years, doing improvs on the concert stages all across the world, that has kept my intuition very fresh and sharp. I'm just working long distance with Melissa Manchester and then finally being in person for the last part of writing our song together called “New Eyes.” It was an amazing experience because it's that kind of give and take where you don't know what's going to happen.
And then writing a song with Amanda McBroom, this beautiful story that's from The Reader's Digest. It was an actual story from 1966. I just said, “Amanda, you're the great storyteller, you write the words.” I didn't want to write the words. I knew she was the one and out came these words. When I hear words, I immediately hear music. When I see them, music comes to my head. When I hear music, I don't know what the words are until much later. That's a long answer, but now you know.
The fact is that I find with all of these collaborations on the new album that you take a different tack, depending upon which singer you're singing with. Kurt Elling swings a little more. You and Tierney together. You're right. You do sound like flutes and cellos blending together. Melissa Manchester, a little more country, a little more rural. Niki Harris, more choral almost, almost like a gospel blues feeling. It really is astounding that you were able to, I don't know, become somebody else, depending upon who you're singing with.
Well, i's the many facets of who I am though. It’s like, where do we meet? What is the bridge between the two of us? And also what's the bridge between the meaning of the words and the music and how I feel about how I want to tell the story? When I sang “Love and Let Love” by myself, I sang it as a beautiful ballad. It was very powerful. People were crying and screaming. But when Trey Henry showed me this sort of funky, fun celebration of it, I thought, “Wow, what a fresh, wonderful way to spread the message.” I love the collaborative process over three years. Usually I do an album in like two days and then do some overdubs and stuff. But this was almost like doing a compilation CD, even though it was all me.
Then you collaborate with the incredible Alan Bergman of all people, who turned 98 this past September. Did that collaboration take place during the pandemic, or was it earlier?
I think it might have been just before. My sister, Liz Calloway, wanted to do a project where all the songwriting friends she had would write her a song. So she said to me why don't you see if you can write a melody that Alan Bergman would like because that's how he only writes. He doesn't never writes the words first you know and thank God he had a tape recorder when Michel Legrand wrote “What Are You Doing the Rest of Your Life.” I sent him this melody and I told him what Liz wanted the song to be about and then out came this lyric and it was just like magic and I was I hope we can do more together.
We'll see what happens, but I worship him. He and his wife to me were two of the finest lyricists of all time. And great people as well.
And of course we miss Marilyn, who passed at the beginning of 2022. We certainly always will. I know sung together before, but I really am touched by the fact that you and your sister, Liz, actually closed this album. Did you write that song together?
No, she's exploring songwriting right now. It's funny you mention that. I wrote that song many years ago, and I want listeners to know that I have a beautiful, digital art book that's available on my website if you get things only through streaming.
But if you get the album, read the song stories because originally I wrote that song because a friend of mine had just died of AIDS. I wasn't going to be able to go to his funeral. So I turned my tape recorder on and I played the piano and sang to him. I sang to his soul and I sang everything I needed to say to him. Thank God I had that recording because that was the song that came out. And then all these gay choruses around the country recorded them and other people included it in their funerals and celebrations of people's lives. You don't want to include a song about death in many records. But it's a pandemic. We lost millions of people and they were not properly honored. They still aren't properly honored. And my sister and I miss our parents so much. They were such incredible people. We were really happy to get a chance to sing our love to our parents and the other people that we miss so much. It was a thrilling experience to get to express that.
I have to say what made the song even more powerful was when Trey was arranging the song, he lost his beloved brother at a very young age to an unexpected heart attack, the day he was arranging the song. I can say that music is the bridge between heaven and earth, and we sort of felt some earthly feelings as we were going through the whole process of recording and singing this.
I'm sure that you and Liz have been singing together all your lives and being someone who grew up singing with both of my brothers because our mother was a vocalist and trained all of us to sing.
Oh, I never knew that.
One of the greatest joys of my life was to sing with my brothers. And I know that you probably feel the same way.
Oh yes, there's nothing like the magic that I have with my sister. Part of it is because we've known each other all our lives, part of it is because we love each other so much, and another part of it is because we bring different approaches, different voices, different personalities, and we bring them together in a fresh way. We find a way of arranging things together that we both like, even though we're so different. It’s magical when you take different things and put them together in a way.
We've been singing for a long time together and we're going to be doing a new show at Christmas time at 54 Below called “Yuletide Revelry.” I'll be doing a few songs from the CD and we're going to do a Christmas song I wrote, that was on my first Christmas album that Liz and I recorded. There's just the growing up with our mom was a singer, pianist and a voice teacher. And our dad, who loved music so much too. It was a very inspiring background to have to become two singers.
Having also lost both my parents, I can understand why getting together with your sister and singing really keeps them alive and present.
I will share an interesting story. I have a friend who's a psychic medium and when my father died of an unexpected heart attack, I was so devastated. She was able to connect me to his spirit. I don't know how many people embrace this idea, but he literally told me, I'd like to come to you in rainbows and I'd like to sit in the front row, in your shows here, now that I'm not on earth. Aafter that conversation on the phone with him and through her, there was a tiny little cloud in a cloudless sky that had a rainbow on it.
That night, I had a sold-out show, and there were two empty seats in the very front row. And I was like, are you kidding me? I did a tribute to Ella Fitzgerald, two days after my mother died. And I always picture people, and I sing to my little cloud of angels. I swear to God, my mother and Ella Fitzgerald, when I sang “Every Time We Say Goodbye,” they looked at each other and they held hands during the song. These are things that maybe people don't understand but this is what singers deal with sometimes. We're not only singing in one world.
This conversation has been edited for brevity and clarity.
