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The Revolutionary Act of Grace: A Conversation with Lizz Wright

Sep 20, 2017

The Revolutionary Act of Grace: A Conversation with Lizz Wright

Lizz Wright admittedly wasnā€™t thrilled when her label approached her about doing a covers album to follow her gospel standards release in 2015, Fellowship & Surrender, but she charged herself with a task: Find a message and use other peopleā€™s voices to help convey it. To that end, she turned to a musical past ripe with the bold, brazen truth-tellers who stood against their respective times and shared a greater meaning. The resulting tracklist for her new album, Grace, reads like a whoā€™s who index: Thereā€™s Ray Charles, Allen Toussaint, k.d. lang, Sister Rosetta Tharpe, and, of course, Nina Simone. That last voice, in particular, presented Wright with a charged political call, though Grace isnā€™t overtly political in the traditional sense. The politics she presents — if indeed they can be called that — are the notion that grace offers a way forward amidst troubled times.

The idea for Grace coalesced before she discovered what would become the albumā€™s title track — a cover of Canadian singer Rose Cousins‘ song ā€œGraceā€ (off her 2017 album, Natural Conclusion). A songwriter at heart, Wright intended to pen her own take on grace, but producer Joe Henry (who also produced Natural Conclusion) played her Cousinsā€™ song, and the resulting thunderclap was too powerful to ignore. Where Cousinsā€™ reckoning with grace takes place internally, Wright sings as if sheā€™s doing battle on behalf of a community largely craving but failing to find that very gift. Grace, as Cousins suggests in her writing and Wright executes in her performance, isnā€™t something merited or earned. Itā€™s the simple — at times astounding — act of acceptance. In Wrightā€™s hands, that last, loaded word is a revolutionary act, and a potent message for the present.

You drew inspiration from the 2015 documentary What Happened, Miss Simone? and, of course, her repertoire encompassed politically charged songs. How does Grace stand as a revolutionary statement?

Every time I make a record, I check in to Ninaā€™s catalogue, and I also check in to Roberta Flackā€™s catalogue. But the beautiful thing that happened this time around is, itā€™s also Ella Fitzgeraldā€™s centennial year, so it was all this saturation coming from different ends. I kept thinking about these women, and how they all lived through times where they had to step into their full humanity and express their genius, express their opinion, onstage. I thought about the grace of who they are — especially Nina Simone, in this case — because I think all these women who inspire what I do have exemplified grace as embodying the possibility thatā€™s not realized around them. It takes a lot of strength to become something that your environment might not embrace or support. In my own way, Iā€™m returning to their wisdom and to that gentle, very deep strength of singing from a place of belonging and understanding.

The Revolutionary Act of Grace: A Conversation with Lizz Wright

Thereā€™s a lot of music coming out nowadays that attempts to make a political statement responding to the times, but ā€œGraceā€ feels like a loaded idea in its own right, because itā€™s an adherence to love.

I really believe itā€™s love that changes us. I really love the earth a lot. I really love growing food — I come from a line of really serious gardeners and, even in times of slavery and sharecroppers, we were providers. Iā€™m so proud of that. Iā€™m also really moved by the kind of communication the earth helps us to have; there is a mirror activity or natural phenomenon that reflects everything that we are trying to figure out as human beings. Seriously, everything nature is trying to sort out, weā€™re walking on it, weā€™re breathing it, weā€™re drinking it, weā€™re relying on it for life. Thatā€™s where the wisdom is. I also got to work with my brother Joe Henry, who I really love. Weā€™ve been friends for over 13 years.

Heā€™s so great at building in space to any album he works on. I love how he was able to let both your voice and the arrangements breathe. It makes sense that heā€™s worked with Rose Cousins, because I know heā€™s done similar techniques with her.

Joe is so relaxed. This was definitely the most relaxed session Iā€™ve had — from pre-production to recording. I really enjoyed it.

Also, I forgot to say a minute ago, Iā€™m really inspired by my neighbors. When I got my property in North Carolina, I was the only Black person for miles, renting or anything. It was kind of a bold move, but I really love the area so much, and it spoke to me. I told the family who owned the property that I have an interest in this area because Iā€™m a ministerā€™s daughter and Iā€™m a recording artist, and I just want a place to pray and be quiet. I just want a place in nature to do that — Iā€™ve always wanted it. Between the way I got this property, and the way my neighbors teach me how to take care of things, and the fact that almost everyone on my little road has a childhood story in my house makes it clear that I wake up every day in sight of whatā€™s possible. I canā€™t be the one who gives up on other people. I canā€™t do it. I donā€™t have the right to. It was nice to capture the sweetness of that, and the faith of my actual life in this record.

Youā€™re from Georgia, and now you reside in North Carolina: How has your connection to these places been a source of sustenance to navigate these times?

I was in Dresden, Germany, when the election results came in.

I heard you were overseas! Thatā€™s wild.

It really was. That was a sleepless night.

Oh, I bet.

But the direction of the person I choose for leadership doesnā€™t make my life. What makes my life is the tide of society — what the people are really doing, what the people are really feeling. Iā€™m like, ā€œIā€™ve gotta go home right now, while Iā€™m most uncomfortable, and touch down. Iā€™ve gotta see people. Iā€™ve gotta listen to them and let my own ears and heart and body receive whatā€™s actually happening,ā€ because it seemed like, all of a sudden and even now, thereā€™s been this projection of the South that has scared its children. To be able to make this record with North Carolina-born Joe Henry is a really sweet way to extend the real present. I wanted to make sure that spirit was captured in this project. I was really blown away by how hard a few people are working to make it look like a different time than it is.

Isnā€™t it? Theyā€™re putting so much energy into it.

It breaks my heart, because the candle of life is something thatā€™s vulnerable, and it took so many miracles to stand in this realm together. And weā€™re so blessed with so much liberty and opportunity and everything. Even the limitations bring strength. Iā€™ll say this: I had a really interesting conversation with a cab driver in London. I donā€™t know why this man opened up to me, but he said to me, ā€œI donā€™t want you to think Iā€™m a bad person, but I understand how Brexit happened. I understand how your president happened. There are a lot of old folks looking around at where we grew up, and we donā€™t recognize the people there. They donā€™t seem to recognize us, and the actual culture and the story of who we are and where we came from, and we donā€™t know what else to do but resist.ā€ I thanked him when I got out, because he gave me a real warm hope about the other side of what Iā€™d been seeing and experiencing. Itā€™s about a terrible exercise in negotiating power and influence between generations, not just cultures. People arenā€™t asking questions of one another: ā€œWhat does it feel like to be you?ā€

Right, listening is a critical skill weā€™ve really lost touch with.

One day, I was working with one of my neighbors; he brought me a bunch of tools and came over. Weā€™d been working for almost four hours when it started to rain, and heā€™s carrying bushels of trimmings and stuff in his arms. He barely speaks — heā€™s extremely shy — but he said to me, ā€œWe have our family get together the last week of this month every year, and weā€™d love it if you came.ā€

Oh, wow!

I was like, ā€œWhat?ā€ Itā€™s so crazy. My horrible little childish mind with no experience of that kind of openness totally went to ā€œYour boat is lost at sea, and youā€™re stranded on an island, and youā€™re on a pig-roaster by nighttime,ā€ you know? [Laughs] I showed up to their gathering, and it totally changed my life. Yes, it was a little bit awkward, and yes, I was surrounded by Trump supporters, and yes, I was welcomed, and yes, I cried and I played and I ate, and I went home in a state of wonder that informed everything Iā€™m trying to do on a larger scale.

Bless you for hanging out with Trump supporters for a whole evening.

In an hour, they meant so much to me. They are so much like my family that I felt ridiculous for ever thinking anything else.

The Revolutionary Act of Grace: A Conversation with Lizz Wright

Thereā€™s clearly nuance involved — or should be — with how we consider opposing political parties. But I have to ask, how did you decide what voices to cover in this? Youā€™re pulling from Allen Toussaint and Nina Simone and all these people who have shared such powerful lessons in the past?

I was turned off when the label was like, ā€œWe want you to do covers.ā€ Thereā€™s no writer who ever wants to hear that. But going into the project and thinking about how to thoughtfully use other peopleā€™s music to make a statement, and doing that with another writer? That got interesting.

This maybe isnā€™t a fair question to end on, but why no ā€œAmazing Graceā€ on an album titled Grace?

You know what? Iā€™ve already recorded ā€œAmazing Grace.ā€ Itā€™s such a huge, pivotal song in my life and in my history as a singer that ā€¦ I donā€™t know. The working title for this record before I knew anything about Rose Cousins was ā€œGrace.ā€ Just to get us somewhere. And then that was the first thing I heard during pre-production and I lost it, because I thought, ā€œOh my God, someone has taken the time and done the work to find a new way to speak this.ā€ I love that she didnā€™t have to repeat it. Itā€™s so beautiful. I thought I was going to write a song called ā€œGrace.ā€

Which isnā€™t to say that you couldnā€™t.

No! When itā€™s done, itā€™s done. The thing about being a writer is to recognize when the word has happened, and to give voice to it. She did this beautiful thing, and I was very excited that we still have people who take time and think and process life on a level where they can write something like that. I was just like, ā€œOh, I gotta serve this.ā€ It was a great.

Well, itā€™s a beautiful rendition and, if we ever get a duet out of both of you one day ā€¦

Oh my gosh, Iā€™d be so undone. Weā€™ve been sending these goofy emails of mutual admiration, but I really appreciate her for writing that piece, and I wish her all the best. Iā€™m excited to meet her at some point on this tour.


Photo credit: Jesse Kitt

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The Revolutionary Act of Grace: A Conversation with Lizz Wright
The Revolutionary Act of Grace: A Conversation with Lizz Wright