Quick Q and A with Wendy Waldman
 by Kathy S-B  ·  20 September 2009

Award winning songwriter Wendy Waldman has been on my radar since the 1970s when I first discovered her solo albums. Even saw her once at an outdoor rock festival. So it’s with great pleasure and pride that we bring her to the fabulous me&thee on September 25 along with her fellow Refugees, Deborah Holland, and Cindy Bullens. Here’s a video of Wendy singing her Grammy winning song “Save the Best for Last.” It’s a real treat hearing the glorious harmonies by Wendy, Deborah, and Cindy. In fact, you can hear the very same song on the Refugees’ MySpace page. Learn more about Wendy at her website.

I’m very impressed by the wide assortment of production work that you have done over the years. Any particular recording studio memories you’d like to share?

Producing the last album _New Grass Revival_ made as a group was an incredible experience for me — I learned more about diplomacy, record-making, business, music, and also how to keep working when you’re pregnant — than any other project I’ve ever done. It was inspiring, exhilarating, at times quite unnerving — but it was a privilege as well. Imagine: Bela Fleck, Sam Bush, John Cowan, and Pat Flynn all in a room making music together. It was like an unstoppable train.

Do you use a different part of yourself when you’re working on someone else’s songs? Have you had to learn how to be diplomatic in the studio? Is it difficult to keep the songwriter’s vision intact and not morph it into a Wendy Waldman song?

I am very diplomatic in the studio, always have been. This comes from, one hopes, having manners if nothing else. Also, as an artist myself, I know historically how deep the wounds can go if you are treated unkindly. One of the sources of pride for me is that when I work with another artist, their records come out sounding like THEM. I’ve produced bluegrass, Christian music, European pop, hard rock, jam grass, jazz, country and folk to name a few. Certainly, those are not all descriptions of ME — the fun is actually NOT doing your own thing in someone else’s music, but getting to go on their wavelength and figuring out how to make THEIR record. I get to make my own CDs, so I’m not frustrated by working with other artists.

Was it difficult being a female producer? Even after all these years, it seems as though the number of female producers is still relatively low.

Nashville, which is where I cut my teeth as a record producer, was very generous to me, and though it IS difficult to be a woman working in what is still primarily a man’s field, I couldn’t have had a better environment in which to learn and begin the process. It continues to this day, and it’s a lot easier in some ways than it was back then — but there are still those days . . . women are raised to please and to be accommodating and careful. And sometimes in the studio and in business, that’s not the best approach, believe it or not.

The Refugees shows that I’ve seen at NERFA and Folk Alliance have proven (to me) that this act is a lot of fun and pretty high energy. Is it as much fun as it looks?

I have to say I have never had as much fun in any group situation as I do with the Refugees. There are days when it feels like a reward for many hard years of dues, regardless of what the eventual “business” outcome is. It gets better, and it’s a true laboratory in friendship as well as effort to improve oneself musically and as a performer. It’s a very blessed opportunity for me, and it’s a TOTAL blast.