| IN THE SPIRIT The EDGE Interview with Michael McDonald by Rita Gallagher Rosenberg It's been said of the visionary, five-time Grammy Award-winning -- and yes, former Doobie Brother -- Michael McDonald that he has "soul to spare." The prolific singer/songwriter, now in the process of cutting a Motown hits CD has also sung duets with other music greats like Aretha Franklin, Kenny Loggins, Patty LaBelle and Bonnie Raitt. And speaking of soul, one person said about his Christmas CD, In the Spirit: "Anybody who's got a soul needs to get a copy of this album." Someone else said, "This music's so good it tricks people into (getting close to) God." In the Spirit -- something of a phenomenon -- seems to be changing the way people think of Christmas music, causing one woman to break her family's rule of no Christmas music before Thanksgiving. Other music lovers listen to it all year. McDonald opened two of his summer concerts with his Christmas song, "Peace." At this joyous time of year, I would like to share the gift of my recent telephone conversation with Michael McDonald -- about his Christmas CD, his music and his life. Merry Christmas! Michael McDonald: Merry Christmas? Yes -- I'd like to talk about your Christmas album, In the Spirit. At the benefit concert you did in Grand Marais, Minn., last summer, your assistant told me that the whole album just kind of flowed out of you. Could you talk about that? McDonald: Yeah, it was a really amazingly easy project to do. Mark Harris co-produced the record with me, and he and I just started writing the songs.  I noticed in following your music over the years that it's become much
more spiritual and personal. How did that all evolve?McDonald: Well, I started off writing with the Doobie Brothers and I think at that point in time I was always trying to write things that I thought people thought about, but always trying to keep it on the lighter pop side. Then as the years developed, I think the songs got a little more introspective, but always kind of with the idea that this is something that somebody else is probably thinking, too. And of course that really leads you right into the spiritual thinking and thoughts of "What is this really all about?" I have In the Spirit and I want to thank you for writing the song "Peace." Peace (McDonald/Chapman) I have come from so far away Down the road of my own mistakes In the hope you could hear me pray Oh Lord, keep me in your reach How I've longed through these wasted years To outrun all the pain and fear Turned to stone from my uncried tears And now it's your grace I seek. McDonald: Oh, thank you. I noticed in your liner notes that you mentioned a nun, Sister Curran. McDonald: Oh, Sister Patrick Curran. Well, Sister Curran was a friend of mine. We met years ago when I was in the Doobie Brothers, probably the late '70s. At that point in time, I was a pretty avid drug abuser. You were? McDonald: Fairly heavy, and you know, I think I was probably at my lowest ebb as far as, you know, just personal happiness, the ability to kind of not be overly cynical about the world around me, when in fact, I was probably the last person who should have been cynical -- I was obviously a very lucky man, but not a very happy one. So, our paths crossed in a strange way. My cousin -- who was more like my nephew, a lot younger than me -- we were all actually raised together, my mom and his mom were single moms, and my grandmother kind of looked after us during the day while they worked, and we all kind of pooled our resources over the years growing up, to just kind of get through. So we all grew up very close, more like brothers and sisters. (My cousin) was working at this old folks' home, the Sisters of the Poor, in San Pedro (Calif.), and we just got to talking, Sister Patrick and I, and I was so impressed by these nuns, the work they did for the elderly poor, their vocation and how they were just tireless, and how much they seemed to accomplish. You know, it was just amazing to walk in that place. The kind of place where you could eat off the floors, and they seemed to have time to do the patients' hair, and talk to them, and encourage them, and for most of these people -- my grandmother actually went into that home -- for many of these people it seemed like, these were people who were homeless, they were basically poor for a long stretch of their lives. There were some people who had some assets laid by who went to the home, but so many of them were people who had nothing, and this seemed to be the happiest part of their lives. Wow. McDonald: And so much of that was encouragement, and the nurturing and love that these women showed them. And here I am, kind of a disillusioned, kind of cynical drug addict in a rock 'n' roll band, and I wound up working with this woman as best I could at the time, to kind of encourage their work, financial contributions and stuff that I could make. They were great. These women are pistols. Their vocation is to beg for the poor. Once they got a hold of me, they never let go. Sister Patrick just passed away. Sorry to hear that. McDonald: Yeah, and this was a woman who every day of her life was spent with no other idea in mind than being of the absolute most service she could be to the most needy people she could find, you know, and she ran St. Anthony's Home and Free Clinic, and drug rehab facility in the heart of the tenderloin -- which is a pretty rough place in there -- basically, you've got about five minutes to get from your car into the building safe again -- it's a pretty rough area. And every day, she was there. It became the foremost medical service and free clinic service servicing that whole area for pregnant women, prenatal care and the homeless. They actually ran an organic farm out near Petaluma (Calif.) that actually raised the food for the facility and put a lot of the people who came in off the street to work, and gave them job training. So who she is...she is just probably one of the most incredible examples of human spirit, and the love that Christ talked about. So she kind of jarred you right out of your cynicism then, just by meeting her. McDonald: Yes, she did. She's responsible for a real turnaround in my life. She was one of the foremost people who impressed me along the way with what it was like to be a human being at their best. Did she inspire any of your lyrics? McDonald: Well, yeah, I think she probably inspired me greatly through the years on many, many songs. I remember, one  of the songs I donated years ago
was a song called "Here to Love You."Here to Love You (McDonald, 1978) I've heard it said that The weight of the world's problems Is enough to make the ball Fall right through space That it ain't even worth it to live With all that's goin' wrong Well, let me just go down as saying That's I'm glad to be here Here with all the same pain and laughs Everybody knows Some men think they're born to be king Maybe that's true But I think passing love around Is all we were born to do. It was a song that I thought really spoke of what I was so impressed of with these women, that's what they saw as the purpose of their lives, was just to be of service to the people who needed it the most. There are so many songs over the years since that were inspired by that kind of person. I can tell. McDonald: Not that I'm that kind of person, but I do marvel at some people with the ability to give.... Amen. There are so many people that you've written music with. Do you write the music, or the lyrics, or do you do it differently every time? Do you hear the music in your head and then write it down? Is that how it works? McDonald: Basically all of those things. I do it a little differently every time, but mostly for me and for the people that I write with, we start with the music first. More and more, as the years have passed, I usually have more of a lyric idea. There were times, like back in the Doobie days, when we literally just had a groove or a jam, basically, that kind of developed either at sound check or in the studio or rehearsal, with absolutely no idea what the lyrics would be. As time has gone on over the years, I've sought to write songs from a more complete idea. When you were young and growing up, is that when you started hearing music in your head and thought that you would be able to write music? McDonald: Yeah, oddly enough, I can remember a moment, when I decided I would be a songwriter, and it was long, long before I ever really attempted it. I was about 6 or 7 years old...I was in a dingy, old hallway where my aunt lived. It was kind of a downtown duplex, an old building that she lived in, probably. I think these buildings were built in the '30s or something. There was this hallway in between the living units, and it had a big echo kind of feeling, and I was walking through, and there was just the light coming through the door at the end of the hall and I could hear my feet shuffling, kind of shuffling my feet and it sounded so great with all the ambience in that hallway. And singing this melody to myself, and I was walking up to the door and I thought to myself, that's pretty good, I think I could do that! What a thrill, huh? McDonald: And I never forgot that. I remember I was a kid kind of walking out, running out to play with kids in the neighborhood, and it was just kind of a passing thought, but it was one that stuck with me. I thought, you know, I think I'd been pretty good at that. Then it hit you? I've been curious about that. McDonald: I never really thought about it again, until I had been singing with my father for years and then singing and playing the banjo, and playing a little bit of piano. I'm kind of OK at a lot of things, master of nothing, but I'd sit at the piano, hammering away at the three or four chords I actually knew, and my dad and I wrote a song, which was probably a good seven years later. Did your dad sing? McDonald: He had a beautiful voice. He was a tenor. Irish tenor? McDonald: Yeah. He had a really great voice. He sang all the Irish ballads. And everybody loved to hear him sing. So he kind of dragged me along. I think I really inherited his love of a good song, of a good lyric, of a good story, and that is really where I think I got my love of songwriting, from my dad. I grew up in a first-generation, Irish-Catholic family. My grandmother and grandfather came over from Ireland, and my mom's side is Irish, too. And everything that goes along with that. Growing up in the city of St. Louis, I probably attended more wakes as a child.... How about a book about you. About your life? McDonald: I've thought about it, not so much because of my career really, but about writing about my childhood and how it led me to do what I do. Our lives were very Old World. My dad loved singing. He didn't drink. That's where he came alive -- singing songs for his friends, and that's how we grew up -- sitting on the window sill watching some of the best piano players I probably have ever seen. Are you going to be in any movies? McDonald: No, I'm not very good at that. I wish I was. I tend to look like those people in commercials for Carpeteria. Someone wrote that you're actually hitting your creative stride in midlife. Do you think that's true? McDonald: I kind of feel that way. In strange ways, though, I feel like God has brought me to this point in my life to do something, however insignificant or however important, if only to me. It's a time in my life when I've never enjoyed making music with other people more, and I've never felt like I've wanted to say something more than I do at this age. I kind of felt like when I got to be about 50, I'd somehow one day realize that this is no fun any more. But it hasn't happened. In fact, in some ways it's more important to me than ever. Are you going to be writing any more spiritual music, like In the Spirit? McDonald: I'm sure I will. I think that's kind of where my heart is right now. I have to say, I just kind of follow it. I'm afraid if I were to think about it too much, I would start engineering it myself and get in the way more than anything. I just kind of take it one day at a time, and right now I'm involved in a project and I'm not thinking too much beyond that. It's a Motown project that I've recorded in Europe for a UK label. You certainly do perform a lot of benefits, don't you? McDonald: I try to do as many as I can. I can't always do all of them. There's so many great causes out there. When I'm home, I do as many as I can. The problem I run into in a town like Nashville is, you want to do them all, but unfortunately one takes away from the other, if you know what I mean. It's a little bit tricky. McDonald: You have to be careful not to take too many of them where they kind of conflict with each other. Could you share anything about your future plans -- spiritual future, creative future. McDonald: Right now the only thing I think of in terms of the future is getting my kids along the way. Hoping that they'll actually want to go to college, things like that. In terms of my own life, I try to keep it all in the context of today, and do the things today that might affect the future in a positive way, but without getting too caught up with the results that I'm hoping for in the future. I noticed that in your music you talk a lot about "crossing the river" and "getting there" and about the "other side," especially the song on your Christmas album, "World Out of a Dream." Did you have a vision when you wrote that song? McDonald: That song was written by Mark Harris, myself and Tommy Sims. Basically, it's a tribute to Dr. Martin Luther King. We felt that, given the idea of Christmas, and what we should all be thinking about at Christmas.... World Out of a Dream (McDonald/Harris/Sims) I saw us walking to the river And I was wondering what it means It looked like people had come together As if we all believed in the same thing Can you feel it? It feels like mercy Hear that music It sounds like grace Let it be in my nature To look at my brother And see my father's face. I am so thrilled to have been able to talk to you, Michael, and God bless you, and thank you. McDonald: You, too, Rita. Thank you so much. Thanks for your time, and I hope to see you out there on the road. Oh you will! Rita Gallagher Rosenberg is a writer and freelance journalist and an Account Executive at the Edge. She can be reached at (612) 338-8904 and at rita@edgenews.com Copyright (c) 2002 Rita Gallagher Rosenberg |
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