Larry Schwartz
The voice has changed. She wonders if that’s really her on early recordings. “It’s certainly deepened through age,” Mary Black says. “Sometimes you listen back to this voice that for me doesn’t even sound like me. There’s a purity there that isn’t there now.
“But at the same time, I think there’s a lot more experience in the voice and, really, I think singing is much more to do with expression and timing and so many things other than a nice sound …”
The Dublin-born singer has worked with some of the best – from Emmylou Harris to Van Morrison – and is regarded as one of the world’s finest vocalists. American critics have hailed hers as “a voice to die for”, one that is “spellbinding”.
“I don’t know if my voice is as nice [as it once was],” she says, “but I think the experience has certainly helped.”
Black returns to Australia for a fifth visit with a band that includes at least one face familiar from previous visits, Pat Crowley, on keyboards and accordion. The repertoire is likely to include the familiar strains of Song For Ireland: it was the first song recorded with the traditional Irish band,
De Dannan, in the early 1980s and one of which she has remained particularly fond.
“I still stand up and sing it very proudly, particularly when I’m away from home … When I’m away, I get closer to it. It’s a song I don’t tire of singing.”
The ubiquitous Donal Lunny has helped produce two tracks for an as-yet untitled album due out later this year. “That’s been great because while I’ve known Donal from way, way back and we have worked on tours and TV shows and various quirky things, we’ve never worked together in
a studio. So this is great. It’s kind of long overdue and it’s worked out really well.”
The album will feature two songs by the Australian singer-songwriter, Shane Howard. She first met the former Goanna frontman on tour in 1992. “I was really impressed not only by his performance but also by his songwriting and we invited him over to Ireland the following spring to be a
guest on our show. I think Flesh & Blood was the first of his songs I recorded and since then I have recorded quite a few more.”
She’s ever mindful of the importance of strong material. “Choosing good songs isn’t always easy and not something I would take for granted,” she says. “I really feel that I have to put a lot of effort into that …
“There’s an abundance of great songwriters in Ireland alone and I have been lucky that I have been able to record original, unrecorded material by great songwriters. That has played a huge part in the success that I have had and the popularity that has grown over the years.”
What does she look for in a song?
“It’s hard to put a finger on what moves you. Obviously lyrics are extremely important. I should relate to the song and the sentiment; what’s being said and the feelings that are portrayed. If I get that emotional burst when I’m listening originally and when I’m singing, hopefully it will transfer
to the listener . ..”
She intends to release a long-awaited album of out-takes from her albums, tentatively titled Hidden Harvest. “There’s a lot of stuff and it is a hidden harvest in a way,” she says. “But I’d say an album for really strong fans who might have been aware of me from way back because it would span
15 years, I’m sure, almost.”
Black is the third of five children. Her younger sister Frances is also a noted singer. They intermittently perform “very folky, close harmony singing, a lot of a capella” with their brothers.
“We did a couple of Black Family albums which initially were for our own posterity, for our grandchildren. That’s how we started out. Just singing together and having fun. We do get together occasionally and just sing and play for fun at parties.”
She grew up in inner suburban Dublin, and was fired by her parents’ enthusiasm for music. “My father came from an island off the coast of Antrim (in northern Ireland), a very, very rural, deserted country place. He was a fiddle player and had a stronger traditional interest.
“My mother came from the city. She used to sing popular songs of the day. Both purely for the love of it. The word ‘gig’ was never mentioned in our house until we started doing a few ourselves. Just a real passion for music passed on to us.”
She first frequented folk clubs in her teens in the late 1960s. “I had my two big brothers there to mind me and we’d put our name down to get up and sing a few songs. That’s how it started. It was a passion. There was a real need to get up there and do it.”
She’s a big fan of the work of the singer and songwriter Sandy Denny, who died in April 1978 from a brain haemorrhage after a fall.
“I remember the first time I stood up to sing in front of a very small audience, I would say, it was her [Denny] that I wanted to be. She was in my head. It’s funny, I still listen to her.
“There’s a song that we’ve recorded. I don’t know if it’s going to make this album or not … but I’m very moved by her singing and her writing.”
She remembers listening very closely to the the jazz singer Billie Holiday, and soul’s Aretha Franklin, both of whom were “very American and very different to what I was hanging out with, coming from the folk area.” And, of course, Joni Mitchell. “What female singer doesn’t listen to her and
go, Wow? She’s an incredible singer, writer, performer.”
Black still has an eclectic taste, favors both traditional and contemporary fare, and is wary of distinguishing between the two. “I don’t think there should be any separation,” she says. “It’s all music.”
The Sunday Age, 02nd of May 1999
Larry Schwartz Writer 