Shawn Colvin is an established singer-songwriter in her own right, but she first came to our attention as background vocalist on the studio recording of "Luka" and shortly afterwards as a full member of the Suzanne Vega Band for the latter part of the 1987 World Tour.

In conversation with Diane Addicott during the last days of the tour, Shawn discussed her own career, the New York songwriting community of the early eighties of which both she and Suzanne were a part, and her involvement in the "Solitude Standing" World Tour.

Born in South Dakota into a musical family, Shawn began playing acoustic guitar at the age of ten, soon discovering she had an aptitude for-as well as a love of-music.

As a teenager in Carbondale, Illinois, she gave her first public performances...

There were coffee-houses and there was a hang-out in a church that we used to go on Saturday nights when I was in High School; a few of us would always bring the guitars and I was kind of the resident entertainer among us. But there were bars that began to have acoustic musicians play, it was that time, you know, it was 1970: Joni Mitchell, Jackson Browne, America, The Eagles, all that kind of stuff was popular. It was a fairly small town so it was very easy for me to just kind of move in and be noticed and I got a lot of encouragement from the local people. I guess I was a "big fish in a small pond."

I began playing professionally when I was about nineteen years old. I was in college, I didn't know why, and the opportunity just arose to begin playing at these places. I no longer cared about being in school and there was basically plenty of money for me to make given the place I was in and the cost of living that I had; I thoroughly loved it, I wanted to be there and that's what I wanted to do.

*Do you think it was inevitable that you would want to perform your music in public rather than just play for your own enjoyment?*

Yes, I wanted to. I was an extrovert and I have the kind of ego that needs to be satisfied rather immediately. I was a ham-I did a lot of theatre and liked being seen by people-I liked applause and being a performer. So yes I think it was inevitable.

*In Illinois were you able to find like-minded people who you could work with?*

There's always artistically-minded people that you will gravitate towards and who contribute to what you're doing and you contributed to what they're doing. I don't think there's a place that exists where this isn't so. At the same time I wasn't writing and I didn't believe in myself as a writer and I really liked taking other people's material. We did a lot of cover tunes but the town I was in wasn't a mecca for art like New York where you wouldn't consider yourself an artist if you were to go up on stage and do cover tunes all night, so I was taking a chance by doing anybody's original material. Fleetwood Mac had just become big at the time and Bonnie Raitt was a favourite of mine; I would cover some strange things as well... I still do actually!

*How did your own approach to songwriting develop over the years?*

I'd written a lot of strange songs when I was a pained adolescent but I didn't believe in that material any more. I look back on it now and see some things that are valuable, but basically I was imitating Joni Mitchell and I don't think I had much depth either musically or lyrically. Then I went in a really pop direction-I was writing amazingly trite, stupid lyrics to really fun little melodies, and that was my idea of what I was trying to do as a songwriter. But I had another one of those moments where you get a little more in touch with yourself, and I realised that the way I'd started playing was by myself and the way that I'd always felt best about what I could do was when I was singing and accompanying myself on acoustic guitar and there was this sort of a folk basis to it, so I made up my mind that that was the direction I had to go in. Since then the songwriting's been a lot easier and I have a few songs now that I really feel are right.

I would say my strength is lyrically. I co-write with a guy named John Leventhal and generally he writes the music-he comes up with "twists and turns" musically that I wouldn't have thought of on my own; I'm a much more simple writer when it comes to music, which I like at times as well. I keep an old book full of phrases and titles and things, but I've gotten into a thing lately of trying to write lyrics by free-associating on the rhythm of the phrase that I need-I once did that all sumer with one song but I've really got to work on it and hone in a little bit more craft-wise, because it would be great-right?-if you could just free-associate and not work hard!

I like lyricists, I like Elvis Costello, David Byrne; I like watching the way people put words together and the art of how vague you can be yet paint a specific picture, although I can be totally slayed by an entirely straight-forward lyric. Joni Mitchell was a tremendous influence. People always refer to her as this "confessional" songwriter which I didn't think twice about, I just completely accepted what she did, but listening now I can see that she just poured out facts and opinions and feelings, she's an extremely open lyricist. She could be poetic and artistic and cut right to the bone at the same time, and I try to do that but I think I'm more simple about it. I try to get to the heart of the matter in a much more round-about way; I think that's one of my faults as a songwriter, but to me when it works it's ideal: when you can say something vaguely, without saying it.

*Which gives you the most pleasure: the unique time performing live on stage or the moment of creative spark when you're writing a song?*

There's nothing quite like making a piece of something where there was nothing. Yet when you get up and play it and give it to people and you do a good job of it, that's pretty great-when you're giving out something that belongs to you and you created it. But when you're slaving and sweating and you finish writing a song, that's good for a couple of days bliss and then you're back to hell again with the next idea!

*Was your decision to move to New York anything to do with the songwriting community there?*

I wish I could say it was a well thought-out and directed move for me as a professional musician, but it wasn't. Some people that I had known from Texas lived in New York; they had a country band and they were suddenly left without a singer, so they called me up and said "Do you want to be in our group?" They were doing really well at the time and in some vague way it made sense to go to New York-I thought that things were happening there.

*We hear so much about the New York songwriting "scene"-Greenwich Village, Folk City, The Speakeasy and so on; is there a really solid musical community? How does it all fit together?*

It goes in phases. It began of course with Bob Dylan and that must have been an incredible time; I think everything that's happened since then came from that energy and people and is always compared to that, which isn't fair. There'll always be music there and there'll always be phases when it's at its pinnacle of creativity, like there was a phase when I first moved to New York in 1981 when it had just gone over the top with people like Steve Forbert, The Roches and Carolyn Moss. Then it seemed like it came around again a little bit with Suzanne, and at the time that Suzanne was really honing in and writing her best stuff there was a more cohesive community-they would meet at this place called Cornelia Street Cafe, there was a songwriters' workshop and Jack Hardy had just started The Co-Op ["Fast Folk"] at Speakeasy.

Anyway, at this point Folk City no longer exists and it's all a bit scattered now, but something like Suzanne's success inspires everybody.

*How important is the "Fast Folk Musical Magazine" project?*

Again I think the importance of it has diminished a little bit; it reached a certain pinnacle a couple of years ago, but people have gone in different directions now. "Fast Folk" is a vehicle; their premise-and I think it's really great as a folk thing-is that they want to present songs to the public that would never be heard otherwise, because folk musicians by and large have even less of a chance of getting record deals and great songwriters don't always choose to hang in this ridiculous lifestyle and this ridiculous profession and try to make a go of it-they find other jobs, they have families, and they continue to write but you're never going to hear their songs. So "fast Folk" endeavours to take songs from anyone who they think is good and is interested in recording for them and puts them out. It's a great service to anyone who appreciates songwriting and to the musicians who want people to hear what they do.

I recorded six or seven songs for "Fast Folk"; they asked me to do shows at the Bottom Line, and then through Christine Lavin I got a job at a club in Boston as an opener for their most popular people and within a year I was starting to draw my own audience; they play my stuff on the college radio there and people are really interested. So in Boston I have a following and that keeps me going at this point.

*How did you come to sing background vocals on the recording of "Luka"?*

Steve Addabbo called me-I was really flattered-and he wanted me to come down and sing. But they did that song twice so a few months later he called and said they were cutting it again so I went in and re-did it.

*"Luka" was very successful, especially in the States where it reached number three. How did it feel to be part of that success?*

It was thrilling! I would turn on the radio just to see how many minutes it took before the song would come on, and it was never too many minutes, so it was really cool there for a while. But I'm not that affected, I'm too removed from it: I did a vocal part on one song on the album and it's not what you'd call a major part; that's not important to me, it was more the camaraderie with where Suzanne had come from-that one of us got that far.

*At what point did you join the "Solitude Standing" 1987 World Tour?*

In September. The band were in Australia and Steve Addabbo called me; he'd spoken to Suzanne and she was interested in having me sing at Radio City and then the Ritz the next night, and I said "Yes". Then about a week later Ron Fierstein called me and said "What are you doing for the rest of the year?" which sounded very big and scary; I was trying to work hard on my career, but then I realised that they were going to Europe and it just sounded like a great experience. I think Suzanne wanted to "beef-up" the show, change it a little bit for the European audiences.

*On stage with the Suzanne Vega Band you have a very "background" role. Does that mean that the pressure's off and you can relax and enjoy the performance?*

It's a great position to be in, kind of a theatrical position: I have the opportunity to be up there and all I can do is support the whole picture, I just try to add to the ambience of the show. Basically I'm standing there and all I have to use is my body because I don't use my voice that much, so not being a great dancer or anything, all I have to offer people is the way I move, and that makes me self-conscious sometimes.

*Joining the Suzanne Vega tour meant for you a quite dramatic transition from playing solo gigs in folk clubs to the large arenas on the international rock circuit. Has it been at all problematic?*

It's been a great education for me. When we played a couple of places with six thousand people I was dying of jealousy, truthfully, because it was a real rock thing. I mean, a lot of places are very prim and people sit there very primly and respectfully, and then we played a couple of places where people were wild, and it's a great feeling, it's really nice. But we're so conditioned to equate enthusiasm with hysterics, and it even affects Suzanne: you get a taste of that mania rock'n'roll thing a couple of times and then the audiences are quieter, and she's worried that they don't like her or that they noticed that she sang a song a note slightly flat or something. In the band we have a better perspective because we see that they're hanging on to her every note...

But again I feel removed because I'm going back to the small folk clubs. I haven't outgrown them yet, but Suzanne's not going back and I wonder if she misses it-I think maybe it's a loss. But for me this is like a little sneak preview of what the possibilities are, what the problems are, what people ask of you, what happens within the dynamics of your group, of the crew-I have never seen that before.

*Do you enjoy touring on this scale, or does the constant travelling-buses and hotels-make it a total drag?*

If it were a total drag no-one would do it. It's what you make it; it's a rough way of life but you get to see amazing places under protected circumstances, you have some status and that's great. You have people who want to help you out, to tell you where to go and what to see, although you don't have much time to do it in. You also have very little control over where you go, when you do what you do, and that can be confusing.

It fascinates me how people work together in groups; you get thrown together with a group of people that you didn't necessarily pick to be your friends and you have to live with them. It's a great challenge and it's always interesting; it has its ups and downs, you fight with people and you have great times.

*Would you like to be very famous?*

Of course; anybody in my position trying to be a performer and obviously success meaning some level of fame-yes, you want it. But if you achieve fame then to me you should enjoy that every day for about five minutes when you get up in the morning and you realise you have plenty of money and that you're in a good position, and then you go on about your day, because otherwise you could lose yourself in it.

*Is there a song in the current set which you particularly enjoy performing?*

"Cracking". It's cyclical, it's got a relentless beat to it that's subtle, I really like the parts that I get to sing and I feel like Suzanne and I really get to sing together on it. I just think it's a beautiful song, it's well done, I really like it.

*What is your favourite sandwich filling?*

My favourite sandwich filling?!! Okay...Turkey and mustard.

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