Elisabeth Withers Makes It All Happen
By: Brett Hickman |
Sunday April 15, 2007 |
| Interview |
| Elisabeth Withers isn't at all like modern music "divas." She's a
throwback to the adult, professional times of the late 70s and early 80s.
A time when adult contemporary and R&B were sophisticated and mature, not
all about being "Bootylicious" or scandalous. You can see the regression
in most modern day R&B when comparing it to the poise and soul found in
Withers' music. And the pride of Joliet, IL has been rewarded with a
strong sales reception of her album It Can Happen To Anyone (Blue
Note).
Withers, who in the past sang backup for Celine Dion and Jennifer Lopez, gained fame with her Tony Award-nominated portrayal of Shug Avery in the Broadway musical version of The Color Purple. I caught up with Withers as she was out with her husband and a Realtor in Manhattan searching for a new home for their family. Brett Hickman: How are you doing? Elisabeth Winters: I'm wonderful. Good, good, good. You know, I just got a hold of the album, so I'm not completely familiar with everything about you. EW: Wow, that's honest. Well, I've checked out the songs on your MySpace page and I've done a little bit of reading...how's the album being received? EW: It's in the Top Ten on the charts now. Congratulations. EW: It's really successful. They've been able to change the format from Adult Contempory to R&B. It does kind of straddle that line actually, but it's a little more mature sounding than a lot of modern day R&B tends to be. And I was wondering, where did you get your musical start from? EW: My musical start was at my home in Joliet, Illinois. Joliet? Really! EW: Joliet, a little town... Yeah, I know it. EW: ...outside Chicago. And I remember coming to my parents and asking them, I think I was like five years old, if I could sing for dinner and they said 'Sure Elisabeth' well of course my brothers and my sisters and my dad was trying to hold back laughter of course my brothers and sisters didn't care, they just fell out laughing because you know you've got this little curly-haired, skinny little girl coming to the table wanting to sing over dinner. And my mom insisted that they not laugh. And I remember the song that I was singing was "I Got Love On My Mind" by Natalie Cole, and by the time I finished singing the song, I remember my oldest brother who was like the one that used to taunt me the most was in tears and I remember him asking to be excused from the table. When he kind of came back he was like 'You know what, you're going to sing for all the talent shows and you're going to come to my high school' and it was like amazing and at that point I was like 'Wow. Maybe I can sing, I like this!.' And that's when I knew, I didn't know in what capacity or what it was going to take to do it or where I was going to end up, but I knew I had to do music. And my parents of course they would always encourage me. So it was basically at that table.
"Hostile"
Okay, so you grew up entirely in the Illinois area? EW: Yep. I was born in Joliet, Illinois. Then of course I always felt like my dreams were too big to even tell people so I never really told anybody. But as a kid I was like 'Man I wanna eventually live in New York and I wanna have a loft and I wanna, you know, do music and I wanna write songs.' And so the only way I could sell that idea to my parents was if school was somewhere attached to that idea. So I thought, ok, well there's a Chicago Academy for the Arts, I know they'll let me go there, I'm studying but I'm still doing music. So I ended up leaving Joliet and traveling to Chicago. My parents ended up getting me an apartment at fifteen inside of River City, anybody who knows the Midwest knows Chicago knows River City, I got an apartment there at fifteen, of course with strict rules all around, my parents were there because my dad worked in Chicago and then I just stayed. I left Chicago after I graduated junior college for like two years and then ended up auditioning and getting accepted into Berkley College of Music, graduated from there and headed to New York. I graduated with my Masters from NYU and I just stayed in New York. I continued to work with other artists and that's basically it. I was surprised by the fact that you were from Joliet. I mean, I grew up on the south side of Chicago in... EW: Wow! Yeah, in Blue Island. I'm still actually in Illinois. I know Joliet fairly well. EW: My mom worked at Illinois Bell for years as a mathematical engineer. When we all left for college she took an early retirement. My father still works in Chicago at the Department of Labor. Very good. Cool. When you got to New York, how long did it take you to find your first big break? EW: I was in New York for maybe...I was always working. I did Between The Lions and I did a silly side-kick skit on Conan O'Brien. I did a lot of background things for J-Lo and Mary J Blige and everything was like word-of-mouth so one job led to the next gig which led to the next gig and then I got my ultimate break when I was actually able to do a tour with Erykah Badu. And on that tour I hooked up with Babyface and I started working with him on certain gigs and then from that it was just like one thing after the next. Of course you have your lulls, where you have like little periods in between but it was basically like that, everything was word-of-mouth. How did you come about getting the job on Broadway with The Color Purple? EW: I got a call from Ashford & Simpson because I had been going to their club and singing for their open mic and they were working on a soon-to-be production of a show and I got a call from them and for whatever reason they sort of took me under their wing as their daughter and when opportunities would come up you know, they would let me know such and such was happening and on this particular day I got a call and they said 'Elisabeth, Quincy Jones called me and we recommended your name, we recommended you.' So I went in and three days later they told me I had the job. Wow. And how long were you on Broadway with that part? EW: I was on Broadway for a year. We started at the end of '05 and I recently just renewed my contract, another year with The Color Purple. So how are you balancing doing that and working with your new album? EW: Uhhh...prayer because it's a lot between a 2 year old- my daughter just turned 2, and then The Color Purple and the record. It's a lot! My family is very instrumental. My husband is awesome, he's my music director and music advisor so that makes it easy. How did you get approached or how did you begin the process of pursuing your own work as a solo artist? EW: Well I've always been writing and I've always been performing, I've always done that. That was one of the main things I wanted to get out with this record, to encourage people to think that 'Yes it can happen to anyone' because I've been doing it for a long while (and worrying) is this person gonna come see me, is this person gonna come see me. So just staying true to that and just doing it. Just before the ink on my contract had dried with The Color Purple, I ended up getting a call from Bruce Lombard who said that he wanted me to sign with Blue Note and I thought 'Oh come on!.' Everybody still asked me 'Elisabeth weren't you scared or nervous about, you know, (working with) Oprah Winfrey and working with a legend like Lombard?' and I said 'No.' I wasn't nervous because things had been sort of happening so fast that as soon as I met Bruce...the only analogy I can give is it's like looking for home, it's like 'this is for me,' if you don't like it you pass it up. But he was so instrumental, so encouraging that I knew I wanted to work with him under his company. So it made it easy to write the songs and easy to get together with the producer on a daily basis. It's interesting to see that Blue Note's changed over time. The three most recent releases besides yours I can think of are Norah Jones' latest and The Bird and The Bee which is kind of an electronic vocal group, I believe that's Blue Note, I could be wrong. But it just seems like compared to what you used to know of what Blue Note was, that they've taken a decidedly different, modern take on that old vibe. EW: Yeah, that classic throw-back. Right. And how do you feel to be a part of the new age of Blue Note? EW: If you ask anybody about Bruce they'll tell you he's a lover of music. He never tried to change me. He just wanted good music and it feels great being a part of that because even with my contract, I'm not just signed to Blue Note but Virgin and EMI, they do all the marketing and promotion. I could see if I was just signed to Blue Note and then you become this Billie Holiday sort of singer but they knew Elisabeth needs a little more depth so I enjoy it. It's been good so far, it's a good marriage so far. Well that's good. What sort of experience did you have working for or with Oprah in any way? EW: My experience...it's funny because she's one of the supporters of my high school and so now to see that she's a part of the show, it's an honor to see that there are very instrumental and very supportive of the record, it's a dream come true. |
