Singer-songwriter Tracy Grammer kicks off Concerts at the Crossing with an acoustical evening
By Megan Sullivan
AS a kid in southern California, Tracy Grammer felt like a big fish in a small pond. Growing up in a musical family, she fondly remembers how her father would break out his slide or electric guitar, play Beatles, Neil Diamond, John Denver or Willie Nelson tunes, and invite the neighborhood kids over to sing. “It was the folk process at its best,” says the singer-songwriter, who now lives in Massachusetts near Amherst.
At 9 years old, Tracy began choral and classical violin studies and led regional and school orchestras until she left home for the University of California, Berkeley, where the pond became more like an ocean. The English literature major tried out for chamber groups at the college, but she didn’t make the cut. “They said, ‘How about the symphony,’ but I didn’t want to be one in a huge sea of violins,” Ms. Grammer says, “I wanted to be part of a personal, small group. I got discouraged and put the violin away for pretty much my whole college career.”
Several years later, Ms. Grammer dusted off the violin, took up the guitar and hasn’t stopped singing and playing ever since. The celebrated folk musician will perform an evening of acoustic music at the Unitarian Universalist Church at Washington Crossing in Titusville Sept. 26, kicking off the series’ 14th season. Red House recording artist Meg Hutchinson, who is garnering attention throughout the northeast music scene for her folk-pop songwriting and alto vocals, will open the show.
Ms. Grammer is no stranger to Concerts at the Crossing, having played the series with former partner Dave Carter and subsequently as a solo act after he died of a massive heart attack in 2002. “It’s a really great room to play, one of my favorite coffeehouses to do out this way,” she says.
Audiences can anticipate her vocal and instrumental interpretations of Mr. Carter’s songs, those of other notable songwriters and her own self-penned tunes. During performances Ms. Grammer shares stories with her guests, whether it be background on a particular song or vignettes from her travels with Mr. Carter. “I find that as time goes on, especially as I get my solo mojo happening, my presentation is really like a conversation,” she says. When she plays at venues where she’s performed before with Mr. Carter, many people are grateful to hear more about their work together.
Ms. Grammer first met Mr. Carter after his performance at a songwriter showcase in Portland, Ore., in 1996. “He just blew me away,” she recalls. Within weeks, they began working up material with a band and started touring in late 1997. In the span of four years, the duo released three internationally-acclaimed albums, toured with Joan Baez and earned a solid following with their live performances at festivals and venues across North America.
After Mr. Carter’s sudden death, Ms. Grammer took to the road as a solo artist to raise a torch and help keep his music alive. “At this point, I hear people at festivals all over the country singing Dave’s songs,” she says. “I don’t know if I helped that happen, but I like to think I did.
”His legacy is moving on its own, it doesn’t really need the vehicle of me, it has its own movement,” Ms. Grammer adds. “It frees me up to do more of my own work. After seven years, it’s time I move in that direction. I always look to do Carter songs though, it’s the model of how it’s done. He was really, truly brilliant.”
This fall and into next year, Ms. Grammer is making a concerted effort to organize the archives of the duo’s output. This includes material down on paper, recordings, photos and videos. “I want to figure out what I have and figure out how I can share it,” she says.
Along with label Signature Sounds, Ms. Grammer also is planning another tribute album to Mr. Carter. The first, Flower of Avalon (2005), featured Ms. Grammer’s take on nine previously unrecorded songs written by Mr. Carter, along with one traditional tune. She is in the process of figuring out artists across different genres who might like to do something new with Mr. Carter’s songs, especially ones that haven’t been published yet. She estimates there are about a dozen unheard Carter songs she’d like to release into the music world. “I’m sort of on a mining mission, digging in to figure out what we have,” she says.
After getting closure on the archives, Ms. Grammer feels she will free up mental space to be more creative writing her own material and hopes to release a full-length CD in the near future. For her next project, however, Ms. Grammer would like to compile an instrumental fiddle or violin CD. In 2004, when she found out that her aging violin was totaled, her fans set up a PayPal site and bought her a new one.
”The one I had was more than 200 years old,” Ms. Grammer says, adding that she loved the sound and had no intention of buying a replacement. “I feel like I owe them an instrumental CD or at least an EP of just me and my new violin, the ‘Lovely Vermont.’”
Tracy Grammer will perform as part of Concerts at the Crossing, Unitarian Universalist Church at Washington Crossing, 268 Washington Crossing-Pennington Road, Titusville, Sept. 26., 8 p.m. Tickets cost $23, $5 children under 15. 609-510-6278; www.concertsatthecrossing.com