>> Stephen Winick: Welcome.
I'm Stephen Winick of the
American Folklife Center
of the Library of Congress.
For many years, we have
presented the Homegrown Concert
Series featuring the best
in folk music and dance
from around the world.
In the year 2020 because
of the global pandemic,
we shifted to producing an
online video concert series,
which we call Homegrown at Home.
So 2021 was our second year
of Homegrown at Home concerts,
and it's now early 2022,
and we're doing interviews
with the artists who
performed in that series.
And we were very honored in
that series to have a group
from New England
called Windborne.
And Windborne is a great
harmony singing group.
And we're going to have a brief
conversation with them now.
And I'm going to ask them each
to introduce themselves by name.
>> Jeremy Carter-Gordon:
All right,
my name is Jeremy Carter-Gordon.
I am originally from
Concord, Massachusetts,
and now live in Somerville.
And we're really
excited to be here today.
Thanks for having us.
>> Lauren Breunig:
I'm Lauren Breunig.
I grew up in Vermont,
and I also now live
in Somerville, Massachusetts.
>> Lynn Mahoney Rowan:
I'm Lynn Rowan.
And I grew up right near
Lauren in Southern Vermont.
And I now live with my husband
Will in Goshen, Massachusetts.
>> Will Thomas Rowan:
I'm Will Rowan.
I grew up in Southern
New Hampshire.
And I now also live in
Goshen, Massachusetts.
>> Stephen Winick: Excellent.
So it sounds like all of you
have deep New England roots.
So let's talk about some of
your early formative experiences
in the kind of music communities
that you find in New England.
Whoever -- again, like
this is sort of informal.
Whoever can chime in, in
these beginning questions.
So yeah, who wants to go?
>> Lauren Breunig: Yeah,
I can speak to that.
So we all sort of grew up
in various ways connected
to folk music and dance
communities in New England.
Things like shape-note
singing parties that happened
in my family's living
room, which is the way
that I remember meeting
Will back when we were kids,
and we all were involved
in some way or another
with traditional dance
groups, like Morris teams,
and other contra dancing,
that sort of participatory
communities
that really bring people into
engaging with traditional arts.
And then when we were teenagers,
we all went to singing camp
with Village Harmony,
which brings music teachers
from different parts of the
world to teach the traditions
that they've been steeped in
and share those traditions
with teenagers and adults.
We sort of expanded our love of
traditional music to countries
and cultures outside of the US,
largely through the
influence of Village Harmony.
So talk a little bit
about Village Harmony
and how that works.
Like who attends and
when it occurs and where
and all that great stuff.
>> Lauren Breunig: Someone
else want to jump in?
I mean, I can keep talking.
But --
>> Stephen Winick: Yeah,
whichever of you wants to.
>> Will Thomas Rowan:
Yeah, so Village Harmony,
the way we first
encountered it was
through its teen
summer camp programs.
And they're sort of
structured on a touring basis
where you get together in sort
of a retreat center somewhere
in New England, usually.
And there's a -- you have
a few different teachers
that get together for the camp,
and you rehearse for a week.
And then you go on
a tour around --
it was often sort
of in New England,
and we would give a concert
in sort of a village church
or a community hall or some
sort of other community space
and then would be
put up by people
in the community
who did homestays.
And in terms of the
musical repertoire,
it was really varied.
There was certainly a
lot of a lot of music
that was sort of
based in the US.
There are some great
teachers have sort
of Appalachian music,
shape-note singing.
But there are also teachers
who had come from South Africa,
from the Republic of
Georgia, from Bulgaria.
We worked with a teacher
from Russia at one point,
and there were also
international programs
that happened.
Sort of as you got older, the
opportunity was given to you
to go to these programs
in places like Corsica
and Bulgaria, the Republic
of Georgia, South Africa,
and those were sort of more of
an immersive experience going
to the place and working
with traditional musicians
and dancers in that space.
Lynn and I went to
Bulgaria in 2003.
Lauren went to Corsica
-- I forget the year.
But Lynn and I also went
to Corsica soon after that.
And it was really --
it was really a place where
we got invested in singing
in harmony and singing
in groups,
and really opened our ears
and the way we've we
think about music.
>> Stephen Winick: Cool.
Yeah, one thing that's
interesting is that sort
of North American traditional
folk music has a strong
monophonic strain and like
the balancing and that kind
of thing, but there's also
polyphonic traditions,
like you've mentioned,
shape-note singing,
but Village Harmony seems to
really broaden that out and look
for harmonic traditions
elsewhere as well.
So how did that affect
your perception
of traditional folk music being
in in that kind of environment?
>> Lynn Mahoney Rowan: I mean -
>> Will Thomas Rowan:
Go ahead, Lynn.
>> Lynn Mahoney Rowan: Well,
I was just, yeah, I mean,
I think it had a huge
impact on us as singers,
and I think also the types
of folk singing that we grew
up doing locally in New England,
even outside of Village Harmony,
also had a lot more harmony
than maybe everyone
else's experience.
I think we did a lot of,
you know, pub singing
and were exposed to, you know,
hippie church choir singing
that Laura and I
did as we were kids.
And you know, Tony Barrand, and
Peter and Mary Alice Amidon,
and Nowell Sing We
Clear, you know,
who Lauren's dad is a part
of, that there's just --
there was a lot of harmony
singing, and shape note,
like Lauren mentioned.
And so I think it was
very natural to us
to have harmony be part
of all kinds of singing,
and Village Harmony didn't feel
that different in
that way, I think.
I mean, at least for me,
but I think, you know,
for Lauren as well,
harmony singing wasn't new.
And definitely when we, you
know, were singing together
at first when Windborne started,
it was Lauren, and Will and I,
and it was, you know,
we were just teenagers
when we first started.
It was an excuse to keep singing
songs we learned from camp.
But as we got older and
started trying to do some
of our own things and make our
own arrangements of things,
and Jeremy joined
us, and I think,
as we write our own
arrangements now,
you can definitely hear
some of the influences
of the music we grew up singing
in some of those pubs sings,
but also a lot of the music we
learned through Village Harmony,
and music and rhythms and
harmonies from other cultures.
So I think those influences
sometimes, you know, harmonies
and some seconds, or, you know,
some rhythms in, you know,
not your average
meter creeping some
of our arrangements for sure.
>> Stephen Winick: Right.
Very interesting too
that there's kind
of a regional thing going on
in the sense that, you know,
that monophonic valid
tradition is very --
it does exist in New
England, of course,
but it's also very
prevalent in Appalachia,
and there's people --
when people think of American
folk music, I guess they tend
to think Southern as
opposed to Northern.
So how does that
affect your approach?
Just the fact of
your regionality
in New England, do you think?
>> Jeremy Carter-Gordon: Yeah,
it's interesting that this sort
of the question of
regionality, because I think one
of the peculiarities of the
Folk community that we all grew
up in is it's -- it's
really Anglophile.
A lot of the folk traditions
that were being done, you know,
centered around the
Country Dance & Song Society
which started off of course,
as the Country Dance
& Sound Society
of America being
the American branch
of the English folk
organization.
And so the communities that we
were in, it was just as common
to find, you know,
English pub songs as it was
to find any kind of, you
know, Appalachian ballad
or something like that.
And I think perhaps,
you know, perhaps some
of that was connected to
being more closely tied
with these New England -- it
says it right in the name --
these New England traditions
of the shape-note singing
and things like that, that,
you know, had those roots again
in New England, but, you know,
our parents' generation, really,
when all everyone in
England was getting excited
about these American, Southern
American singers and was,
you know, trying to imitate
them in the folk clubs,
all of our parents were
learning Morris dancing
and imitating the Wattersons
and the Copper Family
and those groups.
So it's, you know, we certainly
did also grow up with songs
that feel a little
bit more regional.
And a lot of the
times when we talk
about Windborne's inspirations
and Windborne's early
influences, I really think of it
as these like three
different channels.
You have, you know, on one
side, you have this channel
of participatory improvisational
harmony that is really these
like pub songs that maybe
is a little bit more
of an English background.
We have something that is
sort of the song repertoire
that we got, which is
a lot of these things
from the folk singers who are
around us in our community
that did do a lot of
these American songs.
But very few of them in our
particular community were
without harmony, or if
they were without harmony,
they certainly had
harmony in instrumentation.
And then the sort of third
aspect which is Village Harmony,
and that really shaping
our curiosity and abilities
and skills around how to learn
music that's radically different
than the music that we are
accustomed to, how to listen
to things and understand
about vocal styles.
And so you have sort of
the repertoire coming
from one place, the
improvisation and arranging
and crafting of a piece,
and then you have this like,
curiosity and ability to engage
with different kinds of music.
And I think that's sort
of the intersection
that we really find
ourselves in now.
And that's been a process
like over time, you know,
our different albums reflect
different facets of that.
And, yeah, but that melding is
sort of where we're -- got into.
>> Stephen Winick:
Really interesting.
Well, you -- so you've mentioned
already in this interview,
two people who I think should
probably be acknowledged.
Well, one was a family.
you mentioned the Wattersons.
And, of course, Norma passed
away just in the past few days.
And it's something I think that
sort of rocked the Folk world
on both sides of
the of the Atlantic.
And you also mentioned, Tony
Barrand, who I know was huge
in your musical lives, was
huge in our musical lives.
He's an artist here
at the library.
He donated his large collection
of Morris Dance documentation
to us.
And so we're all sort of
processing that as well.
If you could talk a
little about, I guess,
particularly Tony's
influence, because I know
that was very important
to some of you, I guess,
particularly probably, Lauren,
because your dad was in a band
with Tony for so many years.
>> Lauren Breunig:
Yeah, I mean, Tony --
it's sort of hard to
overstate the influence
that that Tony Barrand
had on my life,
and really all of our lives.
I think, I mean, especially
in thinking about him
and his influence in the
past week, it's, you know,
we see him everywhere
in our music.
I mean, my family moved to New
England to in the '70s to sort
of be near Tony and be
part of that folk revival.
And my dad, you know,
ended up singing
with Nowell Sing We
Clear for 40 years.
And so like, for me,
Nowell and Tony like,
is the voice of Christmas.
And that is so much -- so
shaped my sense of celebration
and community around
the holidays,
but in just in thinking
about Windborne, you know,
Tony was such a storyteller both
in speaking and in his singing,
and I think that that has
really shaped the way we
approach music.
And there's, you know, we
have so many of what I think
of as Tony moments when we're
rehearsing of a certain,
you know, rhythmic variation or
a little inflection on a vowel
or a little like side
comments that that feel
so characteristically him.
And that's really been --
so we've been thinking
about that a lot lately.
And I want to add one other
sort of person to hold
up that's been a huge
influence on us, which is --
who's also passed away
recently which is Larry Gordon,
the founder of Village Harmony,
passed away in November.
So the Folk world is
definitely reeling from a lot
of huge losses, a lot of
real icons, that, you know,
we want to do our best to
carry their legacy forward.
And we hope that our music
is an honor to their memory.
>> Stephen Winick: Well, I
think all of them would be proud
of what Windborne is doing.
And I'm sure Tony told you that
at some point before he went.
So it's wonderful to have
you continuing these legacies
that you've inherited
from such great people.
So talking about the sort
of history of your group,
you sort of alluded to starting
out, you know, as smaller groups
and ultimately adding Jeremy
and becoming the full quartet.
But how did that come
together over the years?
>> Will Thomas Rowan: Well, so
back when we were sort of just
at the end of high
school, at some point,
I think it was basically what
happened was Lauren went off
to Corsica with Village
Harmony, and she came back,
and she wanted to teach
us a bunch of songs
that she learned there.
This was -- she wanted to
teach Lynn and me them.
And so we were learning some
songs that she'd learned there.
And we, you know, we were like,
trying to think of other songs
that we loved singing
from camps.
And we sort of built up kind
of a little repertoire of songs
that we wanted to do,
and we decided we were
going to put on a concert.
And we arranged with a
tea shop in Brattleboro,
Vermont to do a concert.
And we came up with the name
Windborne, which was sort
of sort of like, that seemed
like the choice we wanted
to make at that particular
moment.
We saw it written
somewhere, and we were like,
"That would make a good
name for the band."
And so we gave a
little a little concert.
We were, you know, 18,
18-19, something like that.
And you know, it
was mostly attended
by our high school
friends and parents.
And sort of we gave
a little concert
and was like, okay, fine.
And sort of over the course of
sort of our time in college,
we sort of did -- we did an
occasional show here and there.
The identity of the group
was very much just like sort
of whatever the three
of us wanted
to wanted do, wanted to sing.
There wasn't a lot of like
writing something new at first.
But sort of as the group
evolved, at some point,
we decided we wanted to -- well,
it was actually it was when --
it was Lauren had gone,
had moved away for a while.
And when she came back to the
Brattleboro area, we were sort
of able to see each other more
regularly and sort of rehearse.
And so we decided to --
we decided to make a CD,
the three of us, and we sort
of started doing
some more concerts.
And we -- that was the
point that we started,
we started dipping
our toes into sort
of doing group arrangements
a little bit.
And sort of concurrently to
all this, as we were part
of another group called Renewal,
which was a self-organized
choir.
It was all people who had
been to Village Harmony camps
and were mostly in college or
around that age and decided
to get together in
January because most
of us had some time off in
January between semesters.
And we would get together, and
we would teach each other songs,
and then we would
go on a small tour.
And that happened for
quite a few years.
I'm trying to remember
if it was something
like 10 years past the point
where any of us were in college,
past the point where any
of us really had the time
to be doing this anymore.
And that was -- it was in that
group that we sort of most --
that we started really
spending time
with Jeremy and singing
with him.
And then at a certain point,
everybody in Renewal said,
"Okay, we really
can't do this anymore.
So we're done.
We're not going to
do it anymore."
And Lynn and Lauren and I
sort of talked to each other
and like, well, we
don't actually want
to not do this anymore.
We could take the time
to do a little tour here.
And there's a whole bunch
of people in New England
who are sort of used to hearing
a concert around this time.
So why don't we just do that?
Why don't we just organize
a tour for Windborne?
And I can't remember
exactly where the idea
of inviting Jeremy to join
us on that tour came from.
Does anybody else -
>> Jeremy Carter-Gordon: Lauren.
>> Will Thomas Rowan:
Lauren, okay.
[Laughter]
>> Jeremy Carter-Gordon: Lauren
brought me into the group
and then I never left.
So that's how we ended
up where we are today.
>> Will Thomas Rowan:
Well, I mean, the --
it's interesting because
like it was sort of like a,
we initially thought
of it as like,
we were inviting Jeremy
along for this tour.
It was going to be
like Windborne
with special guest, Jeremy.
We, in fact, we loved the
idea of having a couple more,
a couple more guests from
Renewal join us for the tour.
But Jeremy was the only
one who could do it.
And we sort of, you know,
we went on this tour,
which was like a week
or something like that.
And right at the end, or right
after the end of that tour,
while Lauren was getting
on the plane to go back
to where she was living
in Arizona at the time,
Jeremy found this link to the
American Music Abroad Program,
which was accepting
applications like the next day.
And it's a program where the
State Department sends groups
out to do diplomatic tours in
various places around the world.
And so Jeremy sent us this
link, and we thought, "Well,
wow, that would be crazy.
You know, a quartet that's been
together for a week-long tour.
You know, we would
apply to this program."
But we only had a day.
And so we emailed them,
and they said, "Yeah,
you can take the weekend,"
because the due date
was a Friday.
And so we, you know, we spent a
crazy weekend teleconferencing
and writing all these
applications and trying
to figure out what
videos we could submit.
And, you know, we put
together this application,
and we sent it off.
And we were very surprised when
they invited us to audition.
And even more surprised
when after we auditioned,
they accepted us.
And it was that tour through
Turkmenistan, Kyrgyzstan
and Angola that really
sort of --
it felt like it was band boot
camp, because we really had --
we've had to be completely
on our game.
We had to be ready to do
whatever, wherever, whenever,
roll off a bus in the middle
of the steppe in Kyrgyzstan,
in freezing temperatures and run
into a high school gymnasium,
and give a little
performance and teach a song
and then run back onto the bus.
And but it was kind of amazing
too because it was a tour
that that we didn't
have to organize.
We didn't have to think
about the logistics of it.
We just had to focus
on the music.
And on, you know, sort of
our creative part of it,
on our artistic part of it.
So we were -- it was
really an opportunity
to really hone our craft and
hone our group sound and get
to put it in front of a lot
of people and sort of test it
in front of audiences, all sorts
of audiences that we you know,
we never would have
expected to be in front of.
>> Stephen Winick: Yeah,
it sounds like an
absolutely amazing experience.
So you had mentioned that
early on, Lauren brought
to you some Corsican songs,
and you were singing those.
And then you were
doing other material
from other countries as well.
Was the State Department tour --
I mean, since it's American
Music Abroad, where --
did you move your repertoire
more toward American songs?
Or did you continue sort of a
broad eclectic group of songs?
>> Lauren Breunig: Yeah,
that was one of the things
that was funny about it,
is that we were going
to all these different
places, but we were supposed
to be singing American music.
And when we were putting
together the application,
we had to sort of go back to
our pre-Village Harmony roots
and think about some of the
music we've grown up singing
because we were supposed
to present, you know,
an example concert of
all American music.
So that was what part of what
was so funny is because up
until then, yeah,
we were sort of used
to doing the Village
Harmony grab bag of music
from all over the place.
But for this tour, we basically
spent a summer and came
up with a whole bunch of songs
that various of us had grown
up with that were American
in some way and wrote a bunch
of our own arrangements.
And this was also part of what
sort of really cemented us
into a quartet was suddenly
we had a whole bunch
of new repertoire that we'd
developed for this tour.
And that's actually
where our album Lay
Around That Shack came out of.
>> Stephen Winick: So talk about
the process of transforming
that concert repertoire
from a State Department tour
into an album project.
>> Lynn Mahoney Rowan:
Yeah, well,
even going back before
the State Department tour,
I was just thinking as Will
was describing the early days
of Windborne, thinking about
the transition of our identity
from a trio into a quartet.
Part of the reason that
it really worked as a trio
in the beginning is that a
lot of the singing traditions
that we've learned at
Village Harmony come from,
from trio singing traditions,
like Georgian music
and Corsican music.
A lot of that is sung
traditionally in three parts.
So it really worked as a trio.
And, you know, there's also a
big tradition of doubling parts.
So it totally also can
work as a larger group.
But as we developed the music
for the American Music
Abroad tour, and were working
with four voices, we could sort
of expand the dynamic
of what we could do.
And yeah, coming back from
that, we were really excited
about having a fourth voice,
this sort of full range and,
and taking that in and seeing
where we could go with that
and really finding, exploring,
like who we are as arrangers,
not just in American music,
but also like bringing in all
of those influences
from other traditions.
So when we got back from the
tour, some of the songs has sort
of solidified over the course
of touring as songs do, and we,
you know, picked up a couple of
more songs to add to the album.
And really, like let those other
influences seep their way in.
And I think that, that process
has only continued more and more
as we've grown as musicians.
>> Stephen Winick: And so
and so -- yeah, sorry, go on.
>> Jeremy Carter-Gordon:
I just wanted to sort
of also draw attention
to one of the things
that I think was a was a real
shift during that time is
that the very first time that we
did as a trio, and sort of much
of a good chunk of the
repertoire that we did
on the State Department tour
with American Music Abroad.
Really what that was
was Lynn and Lauren
and Will had trio
arrangements of pieces.
And then I came in and sort of
improvised the baseline to it.
Yeah, which more or less worked,
because that's what
I liked doing anyway.
And they sort of, you
know, they made fun of me,
because I would do a
different thing each time.
[Laughter] Yeah.
And that was how
that initial sort
of transformation happened
was really just, you know,
sticking something under
what was already going on.
And as we started moving,
you know, a little bit
on that first album, when we
were doing the album process
and came back and were
developing more songs,
and then more and
more as we've gone on,
certainly with our latest album,
which is Song on the Times,
and then the upcoming album,
it's moved into a much more
of this like collaborative
process of arranging songs
that is pretty unique, I
mean, not totally unique.
But it comes up with
some pretty unique stuff,
which is a fairly
improvisational method
where we just stick the
melody on someone's voice.
And sometimes we experiment
who's going to do that,
and we try out a couple
different options.
And everyone else gets
to play around and try
out different chords and
try out different notes
and different harmony lines.
And then after the process
of recording and listening,
and the listening being a
really vital part of that,
we sort of whittle away
and take away the parts
that don't feel like
they quite work.
And what we're left
with is a whole bunch
of really different options
that are fairly unusual compared
to your standard
choral harmonies
that you might write a
score of the same song.
And so it was that sort of tour
and then the transformation
after that, that sort of
led us in that direction,
and really was pretty different
between where we were as a trio,
because we were as a trio,
they were doing a lot of things
that already had
set parts, you know.
These pieces that we'd
learned from Village Harmony,
we'd been taught
what the parts were,
and so we learned the
parts and sang them.
>> Stephen Winick: Yeah, so you
-- so I mean, one of the things
that you're -- that
is implicated
in that process is moving
from learning these things
very directly to listening
to what everybody else is doing
and responding to
it in the moment.
And that process of listening
and singing at the same time,
I think is a skill that
really needs to be learned
and something that you
guys have become masters at
but how was that at first?
I mean, it seems like it's
just so hard, you know?
>> Lauren Breunig: Well,
it's definitely a process
and we do a lot of --
as Jeremy mentioned,
we do a lot of recording of our
rehearsals so it's listening
to each other in the moment but
also going back and saying like,
"Oh, three times ago, you sang
a really cool note on this word.
Like, let's go back
and find what that is."
And sort of, we do
a lot of shaping
of our arrangements
around the text.
And it's not just
like, oh, here are --
here's a line that works
well, and let's sing it
on every verse, but we -- both
because we come up with lots
of chords that we like, but
also because we really want
to be doing that
storytelling with our music.
It's a long process of
experimentation, listening,
refining, so that by the time
we put something on stage,
it actually is quite
refined, and quite consistent.
And so we're -- with
a big exception
of singing Corsican
music, mostly what we put
on stage is not improvised
in the moment of the concert.
Corsican music being
the exception,
because that's a tradition that
is a lot about improvisation,
and we could talk a whole
hour about Corsican singing.
But yes, it's definitely been
a learned process and one
that I think we are
still learning.
You know, like,
some arrangements
happen really quickly.
Sometimes we get through a whole
song in a day or a weekend,
and sometimes we have to,
like put a song to bed
for a few months, and then
come back to it with sort
of fresh eyes, because we
just get stuck in a loop
or can't figure out where
we want to go with it.
So it's, it's not, you know --
progress in life isn't linear.
So it's the same is true
of our work with songs.
But I think as a group we
are constantly maturing
and learning each other and just
having been singing together
for so many years means that we
have a really intuitive sense
of what Windborne as a
group sounds like, you know.
There's -- it's -- and the
thing, I mean, because like,
you know, Will's a composer,
Lynn and Jeremy have
also done some writing
and arrangement of their own.
But nothing that any one
of us could write sounds
like Windborne the way a piece
that we put our four brains
on sounds like Windborne, so
that's always a really exciting
and fun and sometimes stressful,
but always rewarding process
of discovering what each
song is going to become.
>> Stephen Winick: Very cool.
So speaking of these song, so
you, you know, we've mentioned
that you perform other
music that's not American,
but you also perform a lot
of songs that are American,
and you've sort of moved, I
think it would be fair to say,
from a more of a
grab bag approach
in the State Department days
to thinking about the songs
in terms of themes and in
terms of what, in particular,
this idea of the topical
within traditional song.
So talk a little bit about that
evolution of your repertoire.
>> Jeremy Carter-Gordon: I
think it really started in a way
in 2016, in the beginning of
2016, or maybe even a little bit
into 2015, we -- our first
song that we said, "Oh,
we're going to do something
political," was a campaign song
for Bernie Sanders, very
unofficial campaign song.
And, you know, we hadn't
really talked about politics
as a group very much
in my memory.
It wasn't something that, you
know, we discussed really, and,
as you know, I think the country
and certainly our peer group
and generation started
talking more about things
like income inequality, you
knows, it was a few years
after Occupy at this point,
but those terms were firmly
in the public discourse
in a major way.
And we did start just talking
about that a little bit
and discovered that, you know,
all of us shared similar
political alignment in a lot
of ways and I think, you
know, over the course
of singing these songs and
learning these histories
and engaging with these topics,
it's actually perhaps become
a little bit more similar
to each other as we've
learned about some
of the stuff together.
But it took us a while to
say like, "Oh, do we want to,
quote/unquote, be
political as a group?"
And the Give Bernie Sanders Your
Vote was that was the first one.
It was a parody song
to a bluegrass gospel harmony
piece called Give me Just a
Little More Time.
And shortly after that, I
rediscovered a sort of --
I don't know if I would
call it rediscovered.
I remembered this album that I
listened to a lot during college
that was called English
Rebel Songs
by the group Chumbawamba --
whoever knows the
song Tub Thumping.
"I get knocked down, but
I get up again," right.
And they had this amazing
album of a capella protest folk
from the UK, historical songs.
And there's a couple pieces
on that, that, you know,
we listened to them as a group.
We listened to the whole album
as a group, and there's a couple
that jumped out at us.
I think initially, it was
really a piece called Song
on the Times.
And then another one.
What was the other
one that we did?
Right off the bat?
[ Inaudible ]
Yes, Will did some
arranging for that.
And so we looked at the
songs, and it just felt like,
these are discourses that are
happening in our present day,
and how can we, you know,
use these songs that are 100
or 400 years old but feel
like they were written,
you know, in 2016?
And we started singing
those, and the response
from audiences was
really powerful.
And, you know, it went from
people always would come
up to us after concerts
and say, "Wow,
this is such beautiful music.
I love your harmonies.
This is really great."
But then they were starting
to come up to us and say,
like, "This is uplifting.
This gives me hope.
This, like, makes -- this
is like what we need.
This, like, gives me the
strength to keep fighting
for these important issues."
And that I think, had a
powerful effect on us.
And, you know, we came up
with this idea for an album
of all songs from
past movements.
And that's what turned
into the book
and CD of Song on the Times.
But it really, you know,
it developed our awareness
of these issues as a band, and
it became really clear that,
you know, this connection
between folk music
and progressive social action
has been a long-standing one,
and certainly one that we feel
aligned with, and I'm glad
that we sort of made that switch
and aligned ourselves
in that direction.
>> Stephen Winick: Yeah,
so it's a wonderful album
and book as well.
And just amazing to have that
kind of history of topical song
within the folk tradition is
very, a very neat project.
And it to a certain
extent, that work into your,
your work with the
Archive Challenge as well.
So let's talk about
your participation
in the American Folklife
Center's Archive Challenge.
So how did you -- how were
you initially contacted
by the Archive to work on
a song from our archive?
>> Jeremy Carter-Gordon: Yeah,
the initial the initial contact
was we were going to FAI,
Folk Alliance International.
And we got an email, I
think, along with all
of the other official
showcase artists asking us
if we would be interested
in participating.
And we liked the idea.
I mean, you know, finding
old songs and putting them
in our style, and updating
or adapting them is really
the core of what we do.
So we're like, oh,
this fits entirely.
And we started sort of
looking through these archives,
and I'm going to
pass it over to Lynn,
because I think that's maybe
the person to tell the story
of how we actually found and
adapted this song in particular.
>> Lynn Mahoney Rowan:
Well, I think Will
and I were doing some listening,
you know, like, late at night
in our room like we do.
Just because that's such
a long process, you know,
just listening to so many songs
and trying to find something.
It's a really interesting
process
that Windborne goes through, not
just with the Archive Challenge,
but in general, of sort
of listening to a song
and imagining what it could be,
even though that's not what
you're actually listening.
There has to be something in
it that grabs us, you know,
ideally, both in the lyrics
and in the melody both.
Although we have been known
to, you know, completely,
like Jeremy mentioned
earlier, do parodies.
Completely rewrite songs if
we really like the melody.
But we really wanted
to find something
that spoke to us in some way.
And I mean, we came up with one.
We heard Lilly Steele singing
this song of hard times.
And I mean, go listen
to her voice, right?
It's just like -- oh, she just
grabs you right off the bat.
So I think instantly we
were you know, a little bit
like paying attention
suddenly when we heard that one
because a lot of like listen
to something, definitely not,
listen to something,
definitely not,
listen to something
a little bit longer.
I mean, maybe that
could go somewhere.
I don't know.
Listen to something and that
one, just instantly that voice.
Whether or not we were
going to consider it,
we had to listen to it.
Right? [Inaudible] And because
I think we had already been
thinking along these lines of
sort of protest music and songs
with a bit of a social message,
I think we were already
primed to hear some of that.
And so when we heard this one,
which is this really biting kind
of ironic social commentary
complaining about, you know,
so and so's cheating so
and so, and now, gosh,
everyone's cheating everyone.
And boy, it's hard times
because everyone's cheating
everybody else.
And it was a little bit
unclear even whether the message
of the song was people
were cheating
because it was hard times,
or the fact that people
were cheating was making it
hard times.
Maybe some of both.
But I mean, the song itself,
the melody was really a little
bit unusual and lilting,
and of course, the
way she sung it.
But I mean, we instantly just --
we knew that this
was probably the one.
I remember we didn't -- we
sent that one to the other two.
And I don't even think we sent
them other options at first.
We said, "Well, we have
some other options, I think,
but like, this is really --
this is the one that
we want to work on."
And I think, even before
I heard their response,
I started learning the melody
because I was just
so taken with it.
I remember, I think at a certain
point, when we had decided, yes,
we will definitely work on
this one, this is the one,
there was a long car
ride to a gig, you know.
That's -- as you know, the
other half of what we do
for a living is drive, right?
>> Stephen Winick: What
I actually do, yeah.
>> Lynn Mahoney Rowan:
We were in the car
and I was just listening
to the song on loop,
trying to learn the melody.
And I think I started out
by really trying to very,
very closely mimic
her inflections
to really get a good sense
of what she did with it.
Because it wasn't even
obvious at first even
where the meter was, I mean,
because she's singing
it unaccompanied,
and it's this field recording
the scratchy recording.
And of course it -- I think it
starts even partway through.
She hasn't right -- not
even like, here we go,
and that she's sort of
in the middle of it,
in middle of a phrase.
And so I was even just
trying to get a sense
of what is the meter
of the song?
What is the melody of the song?
What's variation versus
melody, and what's meter
versus trying to
squeeze in words?
One of the verses, it's
really funny, she sort of fits
in a whole bunch of [inaudible].
Just sort of at this one verse,
which again, goes [inaudible].
[Laughter] It's almost like
she was like trying to think
of what the words were, and then
sort of caught up and anyway.
But it was really lovely.
And so I started out really
imitating her until I felt
like I really knew it
and really learned it.
And then after that it became
a process of, I don't want
to just be imitating her and
finding my own voice in it.
And so then I think by the
time I came to the group,
I sort of had my own
way of singing it,
which was definitely inspired
by her lilt, but was trying
to also find my own voice in it.
And then we did our
usual process of sort
of everyone trying out different
things and different harmonies.
And we talked about sort of the
message of the song and picked
out the verses that we really,
really like and that
spoke to us.
And then sort of, I think
maybe it was Jeremy,
who had the concept of how the
-- we could take it further.
How we could sort of say, okay,
yeah, there's people in town
who are cheating each other.
But what if, what, why?
Why? Why are things
hard for them?
Why are they cheating
and who cheated them?
And okay, so where's the power.
So maybe this person
actually was in power
and cheated that person.
And that's why they
cheated here.
But what about this person?
Maybe they were feeling tight
because they were being cheated
by this person, and then
tracing the lines of power up,
which is how we end
with our verse
about it all being the
billionaire who's really pulling
the strings.
>> Stephen Winick: Yeah,
it's really interesting,
because if you look at that
song sort of historically,
we have lots of broadsides
in it, which I sent you guys
at the time that you were
working on this arrangement.
But there's like, you know,
there's versions of it
with like, 50 verses where every
single middle class occupation
is involved in this
cheating, but right.
It's the whole divide
and conquer thing, right?
What the song is -- it's turning
people against each other
who don't -- shouldn't
necessarily be the people
to blame for this situation.
So your thinking on that
was, I think, you know,
kind of revolutionary
in terms of looking
at that song in a new way.
And I think that's one of the
cool things that came out of
that project is, yeah,
why should all these people
be fighting with each other?
They're all victims of the same
thing, ultimately, economically,
so it's, yeah, it's kind
of a great new way
to look at that song.
>> Lauren Breunig: We were
like reading between the lines.
>> Stephen Winick:
Yeah, exactly.
Yeah. Something that never --
never there in the broadsides.
But it's yeah.
So. Yeah.
>> Jeremy Carter-Gordon: Yeah.
And of course, we'll send
you this, but I just wanted
to very vaguely show you.
Yeah, this is our
illustration for that.
>> Stephen Winick: Oh, cool.
>> Jeremy Carter-Gordon:
So we have you know,
over here we have the baker
in the bakeshop who's being
dragged along by the banker,
right, is being held by the
politician who's then controlled
over here by the sort
of invisible hand
of the billionaire.
>> Stephen Winick: Very cool.
>> Jeremy Carter-Gordon: Yeah,
>> Stephen Winick: Yeah.
So and that now is what you
were showing me actually is part
of that is your next
project, your upcoming album.
So talk a little bit about that.
What else is on there
besides this great arrangement
of hard times that
you put together?
>> Lauren Breunig: Yeah,
the album is called
Of Hard Times and Harmony.
So it takes the title track or
takes the title from inspired
by the Song of Hard Times.
And it's sort of a follow on
to our previous book and album,
Song on the Times, and that it
is another collection of songs
that all sort of
point at social issues
that we see happening around us.
And so it's got -- it's
got a sort of wide range
of issues addressed on it.
There's a couple of songs that
talk about environmental issues.
There's a song that talks
about settler colonialism
and Native American rights, and
a song that represents or that
that speaks to the
queer movement.
And then, but as an album,
it has a much more sort
of reflective theme.
Song on the Times, being a lot
of labor songs, sort of felt
like songs that are
all pointing the finger
at an external source.
And saying, you know, like, "We
workers need to band together,"
or, you know, we people
of a certain group need
to band together to resist
this external power, which is,
you know, a great source
of music and message.
And then in the past
several years,
as we've been singing the songs
and looking for more material,
it's -- we've been thinking
a lot more about our place
as white middle class
people in the United States,
and trying to strike this
balance between, you know,
calling out the things that
we don't have control over
and pointing the finger at the
corporations and the politicians
that do need to be called out,
but also recognizing the things
that we as white folks need to
be reflecting on and changing
within ourselves and
within our own communities.
And so that's -- it's a -- it's
an album that sort of tries
to strike the balance between
those two things, and not,
you now, not point too much
in that it's everyone's just
responsibility as an individual,
but also not deflect it to
being like, well it's not my --
it's not my responsibility,
because I'm not a corporation,
where we're trying to sort of
thread that needle with this.
And it's yet like,
Song on the Times,
it's a CD that comes
inside a book.
And it has a lot of
-- a lot of writing.
We wrote essays to go with
every song to talk about some
of the issues that you know,
need explaining beyond
just here are the lyrics.
And it's really been
a labor of love
over the past couple of years.
And, as I think Lynn
said, at the beginning,
it's on its way to us now.
We don't quite have
it yet to send
out into the world,
but it's very close.
>> Stephen Winick: All right,
well, people can follow you
on social media,
find your website,
and I'm sure they will find
out when it's --
when it is available.
And I think everyone should
be looking forward to it.
It sounds like a great project.
Something else that's
happened recently
that I know you've been
dealing with, which is a kind
of interesting phenomenon
of the pandemic was
your TikTok experience.
Did someone want to address that
and explain how you went viral?
And what it's meant for you?
>> Lynn Mahoney Rowan: Jeremy?
>> Jeremy Carter-Gordon:
Yeah, I'll talk about that.
TikTok was something that
we sort of have been aware
of for a number of years before
we really did much on it.
I think the first
experience that we ever had
with TikTok was we had --
I don't remember how but I
downloaded it on my phone
and made like one video.
And that was -- it
just sort of sat there
with just like one video.
And that day, we were
doing a residency
at a school in Massachusetts.
And we'd reached the end of,
you know, a couple of days spent
with the students, and we'd
been teaching them a song
and there's a big
concert in the evening.
So this is 2019, I guess,
and we are saying, "Yeah,
it's been a great time
working with all of you.
If you want to be in
touch you can, you know,
you can send us an email.
Your teachers will have that.
We're also on Facebook
and Instagram and Tiktok."
And one of them went,
"You're on TikTok?"
and then we got a standing
round of applause [laughter]
and there was like a little
bit of something that said, oh,
like this is this is a platform
that younger audiences are on.
And as it -- as I hope
it's sort of clear in like,
in the aspects of, you know,
even in putting together this
book, we did a ton of writing
because education around these
issues, around this music,
around the cultures that
different songs come from,
about the different ways that
music and the voice is used.
That sort of education
part is really vital
to what Windborne thinks of kind
of as our mission, you know.
It's definitely making
good music,
but it's also sharing
ideas with people
and sharing knowledge
with people.
And so reaching, you know,
reaching new audiences
is an important thing.
And we got reinspired
during the pandemic
because of this whole
Sea Shanty craze,
that swept through
about a year ago,
a little bit more
than a year ago now.
And we, you know, we put
up some of our music,
and it did surprisingly well.
One of the interesting
things about TikTok is
that you don't need a
pre-existing audience in order
for your videos to get viewed.
It shows it to people
because it thinks, oh,
maybe they'll like it.
And so we started getting
a little bit of traction.
And then we put up this video
of us singing a Corsican setting
of the Stabat Mater text that
we'd shot right before pandemic.
We were in France.
We were in Mont-Saint-Michel
in Normandy.
And we were in this just
amazing room in the refectory
that had this incredible
resonance.
And we were there with
my younger sister.
And I basically handed off the
camera to her and said, "Tasha,
walk around me - walk
around us in a circle."
And she just sort of
like very nicely walked
around us in a circle.
There's this beautiful
light, amazing reverb.
And we put this up.
And in the course
of about a week,
two and a half million people
had seen that, and so we were,
we were a little bit
unprepared for it, you know.
We had to then like, upload it
to all of the social platforms
and streaming platforms
and what have you.
And really, yeah,
there's a lot of discovery
of our work through that.
And, you know, the
pandemic has been hard
for musicians, obviously.
And one of the -- one
of the things, you know,
aside from just not
having gigs and all that,
and the income side
of it, is it just --
it's sort of easy to burn out
and get a bit discouraged.
And I think that
that happened with us
as well for a period of time.
And so we sort of put
a pause on TikTok.
And in the past month
or so we've started doing
a little bit more again,
and it'll be really interesting
as we now are starting
to have a few more shows
and having more public
events and in-person events.
It'll be interesting to see
if we can sort of leverage
that online presence and see
where that goes in person.
>> Lauren Breunig: I just need
to jump in and say -- Oh, sorry.
>> Stephen Winick: No, go on.
>> Lauren Breunig: Yeah,
I just want to say one
of the things that's been cool
about TikTok is that, you know,
I think that there's this
like, sense that like, oh,
young people are so disengaged,
and they don't care
about the world.
But TikTok has, I mean, and
many other sort of aspects
of Youth Activism, but TikTok
for us has been a really
interesting way to connect
with like, these, like
communities of young folks
who are on TikTok who are really
interested in union organizing,
or really interested in sort of
the different kinds of issues
that we are also passionate
about, and that we have songs
that speak to, and so
like, we'll put up a song
and someone will be like,
"I've made it to Union Talk,
or I've made it to, you know,
to Corsica Talk," and it's,
it's been a really, it's been
really heartening to sort
of discover those communities
and those niche pockets.
And yeah, and just realize that,
like, yes, there are people
out there who care not
just about the issues,
but also the care about
the music around them
because that is like, you
know, what we do as well.
So yeah.
>> Jeremy Carter-Gordon:
It raises sort of a thing
that we've been thinking
about for a while is
that for I think certain people
the title of like folk music
or traditional music, you know,
obviously for some
people is really exciting.
And for some people, I think
they imagined something
that is not relevant to them or
is boring or is like something
that they don't want
to engage with.
And what has been sort of
interesting about TikTok is,
you know, they don't
get a choice
of necessarily what they
are seeing in their feed,
they're just like
confronted with the music.
And when they just start by
being confronted with the music,
then people are drawn in
in a really powerful way.
And these are people
who would never seek
out traditional Corsican
polyphony like,
but it sort of gets at
this this core of like, oh,
there's something really special
about harmony, about the voice,
about, you know, tooting our
own horn about what we do.
But all of these things really
that when people
encounter it, it's powerful.
And the question is, like,
how do they encounter it?
And how do you get people
who don't already
know they're excited
about [inaudible] folk
music to listen to that?
>> Stephen Winick: Well, it's
interesting, because, you know,
to a certain extent, these
artificial intelligence things
that watch what we do,
and figure out how we're
thinking are creepy.
But on the other hand, like,
sometimes they will come
up with stuff like they
know that we like music
that we don't know we like yet.
[Laughter] You know?
And so they show us
that, and it's kind of --
this is kind of the positive
side of that kind of, you know,
experience that people are
generally a little bit wary of,
because, you know, there's
also scary aspects to it.
But yeah, but there are
positive things and the sort
of algorithm telling you,
"Hey, I think you might
like this [inaudible] song."
Well, wow.
I would never have
figured that out.
So yeah, so that's great.
And, you know, we're
just delighted
that it's provided you with,
you know, just a larger audience
for what you're doing.
Because, you know, that's
how these things are supposed
to work ideally, and we here
at the Library love what you're
doing with our materials,
and we hope you'll
engage with us more.
I think we're about at the end
of our time for this interview.
So I would just like to thank
you all for being here with us
and for participating
in the concert series
as well as this interview.
So I would ask our audiences
to please go and look
for the concert itself
on loc.gov,
and then use your Google machine
to find Windborne and all
of their social media and
engage with them as well.
So thank you once again, to
the members of Windborne.
>> Lauren Breunig:
Thanks for having us.
>> Jeremy Carter-Gordon:
It's a delight to be here,
and we hope to do
some more stuff soon
and again in the future.
>> Stephen Winick:
We hope so too.
Thank you.