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Speaker 1: This is Alec Baldwin and you're listening to Here's the thing.

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Speaker 1: We can never know about the days to come, but

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Speaker 1: let me think about them anyway. I don't wonder if

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Speaker 1: I'm really with you now or just chase after song.

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Speaker 1: Fine day and it's Abasia and it's Abasaition is Megan.

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Speaker 1: It's hard, if not impossible, to imagine the nineteen seventies

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Speaker 1: without musician Carly Simon. She gained near instant fame after

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Speaker 1: opening for Cat Stevens at l A's Troubadour in nine.

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Speaker 1: Within a year, she would make a chart topping album,

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Speaker 1: win a Grammy, and marry singer James Taylor. Her music

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Speaker 1: spoke to the openness of her generation and earned her

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Speaker 1: critical acclaim worldwide. In hits like Yours Sylvain, Carly Simon

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Speaker 1: exuded fearlessness poise, but backstage she was grasping for both.

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Speaker 1: She disliked the spotlight and had to will herself out

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Speaker 1: of a case of stage fright to continue performing. When

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Speaker 1: Carly Simon started out, she never planned on performing. When

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Speaker 1: I started recording, that was all I was going to do.

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Speaker 1: I wasn't going to get out on stage and do

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Speaker 1: anything on stage. I wanted to make demos for other

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Speaker 1: people to record my songs. So I recorded, hoping that

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Speaker 1: Dion Warwick would record one, hoping that Judie Collins would record.

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Speaker 1: So just I just made a glorified demo. Turned out

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Speaker 1: to be so glorified that that we had string players

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Speaker 1: and we had arrangements, and things got more and more

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Speaker 1: became something that a record company wanted. So Electric Records

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Speaker 1: signed me, and that was Jack Holsman, who was the

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Speaker 1: head of Electra at that time. Well, yes, and what

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Speaker 1: was the song you were trying to demo that Jack

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Speaker 1: Holdsman said, let's put this out with you singing. What

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Speaker 1: was that song? Well, the first demo I made in

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Speaker 1: a studio had five songs, which was just me and

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Speaker 1: guitar and another cat named Dave Bromberg on on a guitar.

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Speaker 1: Five songs, two of which I think made it to

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Speaker 1: the next demo. There was a song called a Loan

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Speaker 1: which I wrote on the beach and Martha's Vineyard about

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Speaker 1: being alone and romantic and happy, and and there was

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Speaker 1: another song called I'm all it takes to make You happy.

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Speaker 1: There's happy songs. Then there was a song that I

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Speaker 1: wrote with Jake Brackman called, that's the way I've always

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Speaker 1: heard it should be, and that song I played on piano,

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Speaker 1: and that that got to the next demo, and Jack

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Speaker 1: Holsman heard that. Clive Davis heard it first, and as

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Speaker 1: did a bunch of other people. And they heard my

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Speaker 1: first demo, and they didn't know what to make of me.

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Speaker 1: They didn't know if I was a jazz singer, a

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Speaker 1: blues singer, a rock and roll singer, a theater singer,

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Speaker 1: a cabaret singer. They didn't They didn't know what to

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Speaker 1: how how to apply me to the merchandizing scheme. Did

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Speaker 1: you try to suggest to them what kind of singer

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Speaker 1: you were? No, because I didn't. I didn't fit my

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Speaker 1: own self into a category. I had imitated a whole

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Speaker 1: lot of people, and I had developed my own voice,

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Speaker 1: but with so many influences that I hadn't I hadn't

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Speaker 1: cut myself off from my influences and made a whole me.

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Speaker 1: The umbilical cord was still attached to Odetta, was still

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Speaker 1: attached to Annie Ross of Memberson Wis, and Ross still

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Speaker 1: attached to Pete Seeger. To the various influences I mean,

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Speaker 1: I still have trouble with that. People say that the

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Speaker 1: reason that I haven't been inducted into the Rock and

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Speaker 1: Roll Hall of Fame is that they don't is that

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Speaker 1: I'm not really a rock and roll singer or that,

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Speaker 1: or that I sort of go in a lot of

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Speaker 1: different directions. I've made four albums of standards for example,

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Speaker 1: which I didn't you know, which I didn't write, which

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Speaker 1: were written by Cole Porter and George Hirshwin and Rogerson

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Speaker 1: Hard and the great, the great people who could write

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Speaker 1: great songs for singers because they weren't one and the

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Speaker 1: same in that period. But what's interesting to me is

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Speaker 1: that when you are years old, that's the way it

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Speaker 1: always should be. Is your first song that's a hit song? Yes,

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Speaker 1: and you wrote that with Jake. And I want to

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Speaker 1: explain to people because everybody, I mean many people know

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Speaker 1: Jake Brackman as a famous songwriter and partner reviewers. Where

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Speaker 1: did you meet him? I met Jake at summer camp.

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Speaker 1: We were both counselors at Indian Hill Camp in the Berkshires,

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Speaker 1: and Jake was the um, the swimming counselor, and he

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Speaker 1: also taught literature. These were very lardy kids, and I

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Speaker 1: was the guitar teacher, all all the kids met me

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Speaker 1: for the first time. They had known each other from

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Speaker 1: the summer before. Jake wasn't there yet because he had

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Speaker 1: hepatitis and was in the hospital. But they said, oh

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Speaker 1: wait till you meet Jake, you'll be you'll just fall

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Speaker 1: in love with each other or be friends for the

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Speaker 1: rest of your life. I don't think anybody had ever

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Speaker 1: ever quite introduced me to somebody before I actually met

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Speaker 1: them with those terms that they would be lifelong friends.

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Speaker 1: And the day that he got there, they prepared to

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Speaker 1: cook out, the campers did, and they said, now we

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Speaker 1: want you to come down to the cookout, and Jake

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Speaker 1: will come down to the cookout, and you'll stand opposite

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Speaker 1: each other, but with with your backs to each other,

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Speaker 1: and at the count of three, you'll turn toward each

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Speaker 1: other and you'll see what we mean about that, your

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Speaker 1: two halves of one person. And so it was one

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Speaker 1: too three. We turned across this fire which was raging

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Speaker 1: between us, and we both smiled and we recognized each

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Speaker 1: other in ourselves and vice versa, and it was quite amazing.

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Speaker 1: And Jake just dropped me off here today. What was

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Speaker 1: it about him? Was he writing? Songs and was he

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Speaker 1: he was a musician and into songwriting, and no Jake

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Speaker 1: was at that point he had just graduated from Harvard.

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Speaker 1: He was the editor of The Crimson and he went

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Speaker 1: in he was writing for Newsweek magazine. He was writing

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Speaker 1: for Talk of the Town, and he was he was

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Speaker 1: the young writer on the scene. He was the young

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Speaker 1: prose writer on the scene when we started writing songs together.

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Speaker 1: He then also got into to working with Terence Malock

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Speaker 1: and he worked on Days of Heaven and on bad Lands,

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Speaker 1: and he wrote King of Marvin Gardens with Jack with

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Speaker 1: Jack Nicholson in that, and so he's he's a man

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Speaker 1: of all words, most of them quite quite funny. He's

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Speaker 1: an unusual beyond journalism in screenwriting. He was a lyrict

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Speaker 1: as he was writing lyrics. He had never written lyrics before.

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Speaker 1: But I had this melody Da da Da Da Da

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Speaker 1: Da Da Da da da and the whole song because

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Speaker 1: I've written that for for an NBC special called Who

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Speaker 1: Killed Lake Erie. That was the background music for that.

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Speaker 1: So when I was going to make this demo, I

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Speaker 1: couldn't get lyrics for it because if I write a

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Speaker 1: melody first, I can't seem to find lyrics to it.

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Speaker 1: It's got to be the other way around. I write

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Speaker 1: lyrics first, and so I had this melody and Jake

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Speaker 1: was by then my best friend, and I said, do

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Speaker 1: you want to try to write a lyric? So I

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Speaker 1: gave him on a little cassette. I gave him that melody,

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Speaker 1: and he came back a day or two later with

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Speaker 1: with a full lyric except for one verse, which we

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Speaker 1: edited out. My friends from college. There all they have

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Speaker 1: their houses, and there they have their silent news, tears,

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Speaker 1: angry their children hate them for the things they're not.

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Speaker 1: They hate themselves, Oh what they and yet they drink,

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Speaker 1: they laugh, Close the wound, hide the sky the lyrics

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Speaker 1: because they're very pungent lyrics in that song. They hate

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Speaker 1: themselves for what they are. Who is he talking about? Well,

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Speaker 1: his girlfriend was just about to move in with him.

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Speaker 1: Jake and I lived apart, will live one block away

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Speaker 1: from each other, but we shared each other's lives and

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Speaker 1: our friends were each other's friends, and I met most

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Speaker 1: of the people that I know today through through Jake

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Speaker 1: or vice versa. So his girlfriend, Rickie was just about

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Speaker 1: to move in with him, and he realized that she

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Speaker 1: was going to be moving into his rooms. And that's

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Speaker 1: an invasion of territory for certain people. And it, I mean,

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Speaker 1: it means a whole lot. It means not only are

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Speaker 1: you going to be in my rooms, but you're I'm

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Speaker 1: not going to be able to get you out of

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Speaker 1: my rooms if you're living with me. So from Jake's

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Speaker 1: point of view, that that song was, you know, are

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Speaker 1: we going to marry? Are we not going to marry?

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Speaker 1: And we had talked a lot about marriage and a

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Speaker 1: lot about the fact that being in love with somebody,

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Speaker 1: living with somebody didn't necessarily indicate that you had to

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Speaker 1: get married, as it had a situation for our years.

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Speaker 1: We're different, Um what what? What? What? What situation of yours?

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Speaker 1: Were you referring the men in your life? Every man

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Speaker 1: that I was, that I was with, I felt I

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Speaker 1: had to marry if I was going to sleep at them,

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Speaker 1: or if I was going to have sex with him

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Speaker 1: in any way, I felt as if I as if

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Speaker 1: I had to marry them and have children. And so

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Speaker 1: times were changing, and this was this was a very

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Speaker 1: different era that Kennedy years were upon us and the

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Speaker 1: hippie dom, the Woodstock era. The times were hugely changing.

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Speaker 1: I mean, I didn't didn't necessarily have to marry the

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Speaker 1: person that you were living with and raise a family

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Speaker 1: of our own, you and me. Um, that's the way

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Speaker 1: they I've always heard it should be you want to

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Speaker 1: marry me, and then oh, will marry you, but resignation

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Speaker 1: with resignation exactly. And so that's how the song really

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Speaker 1: came to life. Was about the disillusionment of my parents marriage,

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Speaker 1: which was about walking home at night and tiptoeing by

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Speaker 1: my mother's bedroom and she she calls out, sweet dreams,

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Speaker 1: but I forget how to dream. And my father sitting

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Speaker 1: in the the room with his cigarette, cigarette glows in

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Speaker 1: the dark. And so it's it's it's all about the

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Speaker 1: separation of the people who are supposed to be married

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Speaker 1: or supposed to live in one happy house together, really

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Speaker 1: not happy in living in that house. Now that affects

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Speaker 1: you when you see them. You wrote a book, and

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Speaker 1: a lot of it includes some of your childhood and

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Speaker 1: your marriage and everything. You know, you're both your marriages

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Speaker 1: and you I think your book only goes up through

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Speaker 1: your first marriage. But the idea being that you know,

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Speaker 1: what do you leave in and what do you leave out? Well,

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Speaker 1: you know this was very important. When I first got

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Speaker 1: asked to write my memoir was six and I was

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Speaker 1: and I was called on the phone by Jacqueline Onassis

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Speaker 1: and she said, Carle Carling, you would make a wonderful

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Speaker 1: writer of a memoir. And so that's how I started,

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Speaker 1: and I wrote about sixty pages at that point, and

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Speaker 1: realizing that I was leaving out the very nucleus of

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Speaker 1: the story, which was about my parents and their marriage

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Speaker 1: and the the thing that happened to their marriage, which

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Speaker 1: was that which was the great divide of having my

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Speaker 1: brother's tutor come to live with us, and he and

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Speaker 1: my mother fell in love, and that was a separate

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Speaker 1: relationship which existed in the same house that she lived

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Speaker 1: in with my father and us and and all and

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Speaker 1: all of the kids. So trying to leave that out

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Speaker 1: was almost impossible when that formed the very essence of

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Speaker 1: me that I was trying to write about in the

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Speaker 1: first place. Everything was a lie. Everything that I saw

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Speaker 1: as the truth I was denied the veracity of. And

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Speaker 1: so when I said, well, Mom and Dad are still

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Speaker 1: in love, aren't they, to my older sisters that say, yes,

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Speaker 1: they are. They're very much in love. And then I

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Speaker 1: would ask my mother and father. You know, you don't

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Speaker 1: ever kiss? Can I see you kiss? And my father

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Speaker 1: would bend my mother down in a theatrical kind of

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Speaker 1: bogus kiss and looked strange to me. There was something

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Speaker 1: very awful about it. But I was supposed to believe

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Speaker 1: that they were in love. They would perform for you,

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Speaker 1: tend to mollify you well once and then she was

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Speaker 1: off with what was what was his name, Ronnie? Where

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Speaker 1: was Ronnie from? Ronnie was a teacher or he was

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Speaker 1: going to teaching school at Columbia at the time. He

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Speaker 1: was nineteen and she was forty two. And where was

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Speaker 1: he from? Ronnie? He was from Pittsburgh, Ronnie from Pittsburgh,

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Speaker 1: and they were they were in love for many years.

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Speaker 1: It killed my father a combination of that relationship that

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Speaker 1: she had with Ronnie and the fact of his relationship

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Speaker 1: at Simon and Schuster, where he he started to do

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Speaker 1: things in a in a way that the accountant who

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Speaker 1: they had brought on board in the company, this guy

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Speaker 1: named Leon Schuster, didn't want him to do. And so

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Speaker 1: therefore my father, at the same time as as he

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Speaker 1: became sort of sick with grief over or his relationship

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Speaker 1: with my mother. He got more and more out of

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Speaker 1: the loop at Simon and Schuster, and they sort of

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Speaker 1: tried to move him up or out of the mainstream

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Speaker 1: with Max and Leon and and that kind of killed

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Speaker 1: him all further. And then he drank too much, too much,

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Speaker 1: he ate too much ice cream and smoked too many cigarettes,

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Speaker 1: and that made him ill. And so it was a

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Speaker 1: perfect storm and he got and he died at the

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Speaker 1: age of sixty. Now signed for people who don't know

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Speaker 1: the Simon and Simon and Schuster was your father and company. Yes,

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Speaker 1: at the met Max Schuster, his old college friend from Columbia.

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Speaker 1: They met they were both selling pianos at Steinway, I

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Speaker 1: guess at Steinwan soon and they said, let's let's go

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Speaker 1: out to lunch and let's let's go into business together.

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Speaker 1: Oh what shall we do? What about books? And so

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Speaker 1: they made a little sign which they put on the

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Speaker 1: office at the office space that they had rented, saying

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Speaker 1: Simon and Schuster publisher what book? And the first book

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Speaker 1: that they published was the Crossword Puzzle Book, which made

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Speaker 1: them a fortune and which started them off with great footing,

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Speaker 1: with good footing, great speed, opportunities to galore, and they

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Speaker 1: were the very center of the publishing world. And yes, yes,

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Speaker 1: and your mother where My mother was from Germantown, Pennsylvania.

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Speaker 1: Her mother, she by, was Cuban and came to the

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Speaker 1: United States on a banana boat. She was Cuban, but

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Speaker 1: she was from Africa, but her grandmother had spent some

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Speaker 1: time in Cuba. I have the whole lineup. Are your

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Speaker 1: part black or you part of Cuban or both? I'm black. Yeah,

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Speaker 1: she's an African Africa. Yes, your maternal grandmother. Yes, and

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Speaker 1: she was African and went to Cuba. That's right, that's right.

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Speaker 1: And then she was schooled in England, and so she

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Speaker 1: spoke with an English accent and she was shamed of

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Speaker 1: what she probably didn't even know she was, but she

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Speaker 1: bleached her skin her whole life, and so she passed

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Speaker 1: as white. But she spoke with an English accent. And

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Speaker 1: we used to always ask her about what her background was,

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Speaker 1: and she would say, when I die, you will find

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Speaker 1: nothing but nothing. And I never talked about the past.

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Speaker 1: So we weren't able to get very much out of mother. Yes,

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Speaker 1: we weren't able to get anything out of her, but

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Speaker 1: she was such a character. Did your mother have a career?

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Speaker 1: My mother did not have an official career. Now, she

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Speaker 1: was a singer, but she and she was a wonderful singer,

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Speaker 1: but she her career was raising her four kids. In

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Speaker 1: your home and your father from a young age becomes

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Speaker 1: a very successful uh publisher in the name, is really

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Speaker 1: a pianist. In fact, when he when he had a

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Speaker 1: bunch of heart attacks and strokes towards the end of

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Speaker 1: his life and he didn't have his mind and he

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Speaker 1: didn't have the capacity of the full fullness of his mind,

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Speaker 1: he always thought he was going to Carnie Hall, when

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Speaker 1: in fact he was just going downtown to dinner with

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Speaker 1: my mother. And you'd say, Sis, you forgot to get

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Speaker 1: off at fifty seven Street. I'm gonna be late. Because

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Speaker 1: he always thought he was going to be playing it.

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Speaker 1: He didn't always think, but once in a while he

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Speaker 1: had the fantasy that he was going to be playing

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Speaker 1: at Carney Hall. He was a great pianist. Yes, so

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Speaker 1: music in your home is classical music on the part

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Speaker 1: of my father and a circle of people coming in

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Speaker 1: and out of your home who were celebrities. And I

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Speaker 1: have two uncles, one on my father's side and one

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Speaker 1: on my mother's side, started jazz magazines, one downbeat and

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Speaker 1: the other metronome. So they were very good friends and

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Speaker 1: they and they had all the drummers and the jazz

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Speaker 1: players in this house that we lived on the eleventh Street,

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Speaker 1: so there was music from from the jazz era. And

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Speaker 1: then my mother always sang the show tunes because this

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Speaker 1: was the great era of of Oklahoma. And Carouse and

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Speaker 1: Porgy and Bess was actually for formed for my mother

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Speaker 1: and father first by George and Ira Gersh when they

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Speaker 1: came over to our house and my mother was asked

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Speaker 1: to sing summertime since she had a beautiful soprano voice,

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Speaker 1: for them to see how it would sound in the

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Speaker 1: soprano voice, or to see what it's it's. I don't

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Speaker 1: know exactly what they went over there for, but my

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Speaker 1: mother ended up singing soprano and on summertime, and my

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00:18:19,960 --> 00:18:23,000
Speaker 1: father ended up ended up correcting a couple of her notes,

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Speaker 1: and that embarrassed her tremendously, and she always used that

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Speaker 1: as the excuse as to why she had an affair

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Speaker 1: and cuckold at him one of them. Yes, yes, now,

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Speaker 1: now your brother, you've got two sisters. What did your

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Speaker 1: brother end up doing for a little my brother is

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Speaker 1: a photographer, very well known photographer in his field. He's

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00:18:42,480 --> 00:18:45,240
Speaker 1: got a bunch of books out. And he started by

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00:18:45,280 --> 00:18:48,600
Speaker 1: touring with Bob Marley, and he toured with a grateful Dad,

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Speaker 1: taking all of their their pictures. And then then he's

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Speaker 1: um oh, and then here he was the Mets. He

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00:18:55,760 --> 00:19:00,119
Speaker 1: was the official Mets photographer. And he's he's done a

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Speaker 1: wide varieties. Is an excellent photographer. And your sisters, My

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Speaker 1: sisters are both musicians, Myers. My eldest sister, Joanna was

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Speaker 1: was an opera singer of some merit and quite a

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Speaker 1: lot of class and finesse and stature, those four things.

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Speaker 1: And she was very good. Besides, and she she was

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Speaker 1: a soloist with a lot of different conductors, Eugene Ormandy

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Speaker 1: and and and she was in New Yorker, or she

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Speaker 1: was with Ormandy in Philadelphia. She well, she sang with

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Speaker 1: orchestras all over the world. Yes, she sang with subin

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Speaker 1: Mayta and shared of time. So you and your sister

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Speaker 1: played together. Correct. My sister Lucy, now she hasn't been

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Speaker 1: mentioned yet. She is the middle sister, and she um

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Speaker 1: she is a composer of music for the Broadway Theater

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Speaker 1: she wrote The Secret Garden. So you and Lucy used

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Speaker 1: to perform to Lucy and I were saying, as the

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Speaker 1: Simon and sisters, Yes, where you and what do you wish?

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00:20:01,760 --> 00:20:05,600
Speaker 1: They asked the three when we're going up fishing for

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Speaker 1: her and fish they live in the beautiful sea that's

335
00:20:09,480 --> 00:20:12,800
Speaker 1: of silber, and go that we said we can? And

336
00:20:12,920 --> 00:20:16,520
Speaker 1: Lincoln and and was that around the time that you

337
00:20:16,560 --> 00:20:18,199
Speaker 1: were in your mid twenties, when we were about to

338
00:20:18,240 --> 00:20:21,160
Speaker 1: break out with your It was? It was when earlier?

339
00:20:21,200 --> 00:20:23,600
Speaker 1: It was when I was in college. Where'd you go?

340
00:20:23,720 --> 00:20:26,680
Speaker 1: I went to Sarah Lawrence? Of course you know why

341
00:20:27,560 --> 00:20:29,480
Speaker 1: there's a joke and the and the and and you

342
00:20:29,520 --> 00:20:32,000
Speaker 1: were singing with her in what clubs in Manhattan? We

343
00:20:32,160 --> 00:20:35,399
Speaker 1: decided one summer she she had learned some chords on

344
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Speaker 1: the guitar, and um, we only had one guitar. But

345
00:20:40,040 --> 00:20:41,800
Speaker 1: we wanted to spend the summer. We wanted to go

346
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Speaker 1: up to the Cape for the summer. So we hitched

347
00:20:44,760 --> 00:20:46,440
Speaker 1: up to the cape. Was the Cape always a part

348
00:20:46,440 --> 00:20:48,760
Speaker 1: of your childhood? Was that the Simon family, Yes, it

349
00:20:48,840 --> 00:20:50,560
Speaker 1: was a part of your child martha S vineyard was,

350
00:20:51,160 --> 00:20:54,760
Speaker 1: and so we we basically hitchhike up to the cape

351
00:20:54,840 --> 00:20:59,479
Speaker 1: with one guitar, and and and went to Provincetown and

352
00:20:59,560 --> 00:21:01,160
Speaker 1: we got a job there and we had to learn

353
00:21:01,200 --> 00:21:04,600
Speaker 1: immediately some more chords on the guitar. But we kept

354
00:21:04,640 --> 00:21:07,480
Speaker 1: on switching around guitars and we played things like the

355
00:21:07,520 --> 00:21:09,880
Speaker 1: Banana Boat song, which we didn't know that my grandmother

356
00:21:09,920 --> 00:21:12,159
Speaker 1: had any any any part of being a part of

357
00:21:12,520 --> 00:21:16,120
Speaker 1: at that point. But we sang other Harry Belafonde songs too,

358
00:21:16,160 --> 00:21:20,200
Speaker 1: and we sang folk songs. We sang some Joan Bayaz,

359
00:21:20,720 --> 00:21:25,760
Speaker 1: but we expanded our repertoire that oh yes, yes, definitely,

360
00:21:25,960 --> 00:21:29,600
Speaker 1: and we built the ship Titanic. When does it change?

361
00:21:29,600 --> 00:21:31,679
Speaker 1: And when? Because when I think of you, just not

362
00:21:31,720 --> 00:21:34,560
Speaker 1: only in your work, the quality of your work, the

363
00:21:35,040 --> 00:21:38,000
Speaker 1: beauty of your work, the range of your work, the

364
00:21:38,080 --> 00:21:40,560
Speaker 1: songs in terms of them, some being fun and playful

365
00:21:40,560 --> 00:21:43,240
Speaker 1: and something really sad. All of a sudden you go

366
00:21:43,359 --> 00:21:47,240
Speaker 1: from being this child of privilege in Manhattan and you're

367
00:21:47,240 --> 00:21:49,320
Speaker 1: in this famous family and everything, then all of a

368
00:21:49,359 --> 00:21:53,480
Speaker 1: sudden you become a big star. Was that difficult for you?

369
00:21:54,000 --> 00:21:56,879
Speaker 1: It was? It was difficult on many levels. It was

370
00:21:56,920 --> 00:22:01,679
Speaker 1: difficult because, um, it was actually the summer that Lucy

371
00:22:01,720 --> 00:22:05,199
Speaker 1: and I played in London. It was and it was

372
00:22:05,400 --> 00:22:07,320
Speaker 1: the summer of the Beatles, and it was the summer

373
00:22:07,400 --> 00:22:11,720
Speaker 1: of the King's Road, and it was such a great time.

374
00:22:12,280 --> 00:22:15,000
Speaker 1: And I fell in love with an englishman who was

375
00:22:15,359 --> 00:22:18,480
Speaker 1: sort of a manager and a mentor, and Lucy fell

376
00:22:18,520 --> 00:22:20,920
Speaker 1: in love with with a man that she was seeing,

377
00:22:21,520 --> 00:22:23,800
Speaker 1: a doctor who she was seeing back here. And when

378
00:22:24,280 --> 00:22:26,800
Speaker 1: we we we had a kind of a falling out

379
00:22:27,480 --> 00:22:30,880
Speaker 1: over Sean Connery, actually, which is in my book. We

380
00:22:31,000 --> 00:22:34,320
Speaker 1: imagined ourselves to be sort of vying for his attention

381
00:22:34,359 --> 00:22:37,200
Speaker 1: in some quirky way. It went around to that. And

382
00:22:37,240 --> 00:22:39,639
Speaker 1: when we got back to the United States after that

383
00:22:40,200 --> 00:22:44,040
Speaker 1: summer of sixty five, we stopped singing together. Whether it

384
00:22:44,119 --> 00:22:48,639
Speaker 1: was because of that rift over Sean Conner over Sean,

385
00:22:48,840 --> 00:22:51,840
Speaker 1: or whether double a seven, or whether it was the

386
00:22:51,880 --> 00:22:55,840
Speaker 1: fact that Lucy was was in love with her husband

387
00:22:56,040 --> 00:22:58,920
Speaker 1: who's still her husband, David, we kind of went our

388
00:22:58,920 --> 00:23:02,119
Speaker 1: own separate ways, and and I got courted by Albert

389
00:23:02,119 --> 00:23:07,240
Speaker 1: Grossman and John Court, who who were Dylan's managers, and

390
00:23:07,640 --> 00:23:10,480
Speaker 1: they called me over to gross Court. Was that period

391
00:23:10,560 --> 00:23:15,320
Speaker 1: the day before Bob Dylan's motorcycle accident. I met with

392
00:23:15,440 --> 00:23:19,000
Speaker 1: him with Bob Dylan, and he rewrote a song for

393
00:23:19,119 --> 00:23:22,800
Speaker 1: me that was uh An Eric von Schmidt's song called

394
00:23:22,840 --> 00:23:26,199
Speaker 1: Baby let Me Follow You Down, and he rewrote it

395
00:23:26,240 --> 00:23:28,600
Speaker 1: for me, and as he was rewriting the words, he

396
00:23:28,760 --> 00:23:31,399
Speaker 1: just he was very high. This was the cause of

397
00:23:31,400 --> 00:23:33,679
Speaker 1: his accident. I don't think it's any secret is that

398
00:23:33,760 --> 00:23:36,600
Speaker 1: he was really going nuts with drugs at that point.

399
00:23:37,040 --> 00:23:40,040
Speaker 1: But he stretched out his arms like this, like that

400
00:23:40,080 --> 00:23:43,520
Speaker 1: and say, just believe me, believe me, you gotta go

401
00:23:43,600 --> 00:23:46,240
Speaker 1: to Nashville, go to Nashville and do your record there.

402
00:23:46,840 --> 00:23:49,639
Speaker 1: And then the next day he was in then even

403
00:23:49,680 --> 00:23:52,560
Speaker 1: back then, Yeah, this was just I guess after was

404
00:23:52,600 --> 00:23:55,800
Speaker 1: that after Nashville Skyline. No, it couldn't have been. No, no,

405
00:23:55,880 --> 00:23:59,080
Speaker 1: but he had just done some some recording in Nashville,

406
00:23:59,119 --> 00:24:00,879
Speaker 1: and he thought that is the place that I should

407
00:24:00,880 --> 00:24:03,600
Speaker 1: record my record. But because he was just getting together

408
00:24:03,680 --> 00:24:07,119
Speaker 1: with the band at that point, so and I and

409
00:24:07,200 --> 00:24:10,480
Speaker 1: I was getting together with Robbie Robertson to go into

410
00:24:10,520 --> 00:24:15,240
Speaker 1: the studio and do some work with that song that

411
00:24:15,359 --> 00:24:18,600
Speaker 1: Bob Dylan had written for me, as well as um

412
00:24:19,200 --> 00:24:23,560
Speaker 1: a song called just Because I asked a friend about her.

413
00:24:24,440 --> 00:24:29,360
Speaker 1: George Jones song, is it he she thinks I still

414
00:24:29,560 --> 00:24:31,760
Speaker 1: care or he thinks I still care in that in

415
00:24:31,800 --> 00:24:35,399
Speaker 1: the case of me and so Um, I worked. I

416
00:24:35,400 --> 00:24:38,400
Speaker 1: worked with Robbie for for for that week, went into

417
00:24:38,400 --> 00:24:43,040
Speaker 1: the studio, had a bad couch experience with the with

418
00:24:43,160 --> 00:24:46,120
Speaker 1: the engineer who put the song in the wrong key

419
00:24:46,200 --> 00:24:49,399
Speaker 1: for me. I sang it and what was supposed to

420
00:24:49,440 --> 00:24:53,240
Speaker 1: come out as what does bad couch experience? It means

421
00:24:53,280 --> 00:24:56,760
Speaker 1: you know the Hollywood couch experience to couch you, Well, yes,

422
00:24:56,800 --> 00:25:01,120
Speaker 1: I wouldn't. I wouldn't be used be couched. I refused

423
00:25:01,160 --> 00:25:04,920
Speaker 1: to be couched, and so they kind of sabotaged. I

424
00:25:05,000 --> 00:25:09,880
Speaker 1: felt that record in response to your anti couching policy

425
00:25:10,000 --> 00:25:12,160
Speaker 1: because I got up from the couch and I said,

426
00:25:12,200 --> 00:25:15,320
Speaker 1: I am not that green, not knowing what I amanned

427
00:25:15,320 --> 00:25:17,880
Speaker 1: at all, but I thought green was a good color

428
00:25:17,920 --> 00:25:22,400
Speaker 1: to say. I wasn't. So you feel that he might

429
00:25:22,440 --> 00:25:26,800
Speaker 1: have been some malicious tinkering with the song, Well, yes,

430
00:25:26,840 --> 00:25:29,359
Speaker 1: And I was shelved at Columbia because that was the

431
00:25:29,440 --> 00:25:31,639
Speaker 1: label I was going to be on. This was six,

432
00:25:32,480 --> 00:25:35,800
Speaker 1: So I was shelved for three years, at which point

433
00:25:35,800 --> 00:25:39,720
Speaker 1: I became a fat secretary. What does that mean? I

434
00:25:39,760 --> 00:25:45,439
Speaker 1: worked for a television production company and where it was

435
00:25:45,480 --> 00:25:48,680
Speaker 1: called Canean Productions in New York, where was their offices

436
00:25:49,320 --> 00:25:54,320
Speaker 1: on Street near CBS West Way West. And and you

437
00:25:54,320 --> 00:25:57,720
Speaker 1: you did that for how long? A year? Not three years?

438
00:25:57,760 --> 00:26:00,320
Speaker 1: A year? Yes, but I was fat for three years.

439
00:26:00,520 --> 00:26:03,000
Speaker 1: Now for you, what's fat? You're like ten pounds overweight? No,

440
00:26:03,119 --> 00:26:05,480
Speaker 1: I don't. I would think. I waited about hundred sixty.

441
00:26:06,760 --> 00:26:09,280
Speaker 1: And you got there was a result of what There

442
00:26:09,560 --> 00:26:12,920
Speaker 1: was this thing that was advertised as milkshakes, and they

443
00:26:12,920 --> 00:26:15,639
Speaker 1: were to be bought at this place on forty fifth Street,

444
00:26:16,280 --> 00:26:20,160
Speaker 1: and they were advertised and they were the most delicious

445
00:26:20,160 --> 00:26:22,679
Speaker 1: things you'd ever tasted. But it promised that there were

446
00:26:22,680 --> 00:26:25,440
Speaker 1: only forty seven calories, but and that they were all

447
00:26:25,480 --> 00:26:29,080
Speaker 1: really ice, that what you were eating was ice. I

448
00:26:29,119 --> 00:26:33,480
Speaker 1: don't remember. I don't remember, but but the lines were

449
00:26:33,520 --> 00:26:36,760
Speaker 1: around the block. It was it was a sham at

450
00:26:36,760 --> 00:26:40,159
Speaker 1: any rate, and were eating this beverage thinking that I

451
00:26:40,200 --> 00:26:45,400
Speaker 1: was gonna I was losing weight. I was eating them.

452
00:26:42,680 --> 00:26:48,040
Speaker 1: Were stashed them in the freezer and eat them for

453
00:26:48,119 --> 00:26:51,520
Speaker 1: weeks and gain weight and more weight and more weight. Well,

454
00:26:51,600 --> 00:26:54,000
Speaker 1: I met Jake around that time too. At the end

455
00:26:54,040 --> 00:26:56,560
Speaker 1: of that the end of that period. During that period

456
00:26:57,200 --> 00:27:00,439
Speaker 1: of working for Cane and Productions is when I I

457
00:27:00,480 --> 00:27:04,000
Speaker 1: started working for their TV show called from the Bitter End.

458
00:27:04,880 --> 00:27:07,600
Speaker 1: And I was the talent, yes, but it was a

459
00:27:07,600 --> 00:27:09,399
Speaker 1: TV show that was based on the Bitter End, and

460
00:27:09,440 --> 00:27:12,600
Speaker 1: so they had performers such as Marvin Gay and and

461
00:27:13,280 --> 00:27:15,679
Speaker 1: they had come they had the same type of performers

462
00:27:15,720 --> 00:27:18,479
Speaker 1: that would be at the actual Bitter End, and and

463
00:27:18,560 --> 00:27:21,400
Speaker 1: I was I was the person who would take them

464
00:27:21,440 --> 00:27:23,960
Speaker 1: tea and would see that they were they were happy

465
00:27:24,080 --> 00:27:27,359
Speaker 1: and happily ensconced in their dressing room. When when the

466
00:27:27,359 --> 00:27:29,800
Speaker 1: song with Jake, That's the way I always heard it

467
00:27:29,880 --> 00:27:34,200
Speaker 1: to be came out was what year and what happens?

468
00:27:34,960 --> 00:27:38,000
Speaker 1: You become famous, you become successful? Well, all right, So

469
00:27:38,040 --> 00:27:40,600
Speaker 1: then I made my first album, which which I thought

470
00:27:40,720 --> 00:27:44,720
Speaker 1: was going to be a collection of demos, and that's

471
00:27:44,720 --> 00:27:46,240
Speaker 1: the way I've always heard it should be. Was on

472
00:27:46,280 --> 00:27:49,520
Speaker 1: that record. Jack Holsman thought it could be you know,

473
00:27:49,600 --> 00:27:53,280
Speaker 1: it could if I promoted this record, it could possibly

474
00:27:53,280 --> 00:27:56,160
Speaker 1: be something, and he asked me to perform. And I

475
00:27:56,200 --> 00:27:58,919
Speaker 1: was asked actually on the basis of the album to

476
00:27:59,040 --> 00:28:02,240
Speaker 1: open up for Cats Evens at the Troubadour. This was

477
00:28:04,200 --> 00:28:06,240
Speaker 1: just after the record had come out, which was the

478
00:28:06,359 --> 00:28:09,800
Speaker 1: end of seventy and so I said, oh, no, no, no,

479
00:28:09,840 --> 00:28:12,439
Speaker 1: you know, I don't do that kind of thing. I

480
00:28:12,640 --> 00:28:16,679
Speaker 1: just um, I I was this, this album is just

481
00:28:16,720 --> 00:28:20,600
Speaker 1: for other other singers to hear and hopefully pick out

482
00:28:20,600 --> 00:28:24,199
Speaker 1: a song for them. But Jack Holsman and Steve Harris,

483
00:28:24,280 --> 00:28:26,760
Speaker 1: the A and R man at Electra were persistent and

484
00:28:26,760 --> 00:28:28,480
Speaker 1: they said, well, what would it take to get you

485
00:28:29,200 --> 00:28:32,439
Speaker 1: to perform with Cat Stevens to open for Cat Stevens?

486
00:28:32,440 --> 00:28:35,280
Speaker 1: Who's who who has asked for you to open his act?

487
00:28:35,920 --> 00:28:38,920
Speaker 1: And and I was thinking on my feet and I

488
00:28:39,080 --> 00:28:41,600
Speaker 1: and I've been reading Rolling Stone, and I followed James

489
00:28:41,640 --> 00:28:44,080
Speaker 1: Taylor's career. I didn't know him, but I was following

490
00:28:44,120 --> 00:28:47,240
Speaker 1: his career because I thought he was absolutely totally great,

491
00:28:47,840 --> 00:28:49,440
Speaker 1: and I knew that he was on the road, and

492
00:28:49,520 --> 00:28:52,360
Speaker 1: so I also knew his whole band. And I said, okay,

493
00:28:52,360 --> 00:28:55,160
Speaker 1: get me Russ Kunkle as a drummer, because I knew

494
00:28:55,240 --> 00:28:57,760
Speaker 1: Russ was on the road with James. And so the

495
00:28:57,800 --> 00:29:02,200
Speaker 1: next day, It's amazing how how things work. Stars are aligned.

496
00:29:02,240 --> 00:29:06,160
Speaker 1: The next day I got a call from Jack Holsman saying, okay, well,

497
00:29:06,640 --> 00:29:09,640
Speaker 1: Kuncle's available when to rehearsal start? And I said, what

498
00:29:09,640 --> 00:29:12,440
Speaker 1: do you mean Uncle's available? I said, well, James was

499
00:29:12,480 --> 00:29:15,480
Speaker 1: just in an accident, in a motorcycle accident yesterday. All

500
00:29:15,520 --> 00:29:20,560
Speaker 1: these motorcycle accidents changing in my life, and so be careful.

501
00:29:20,640 --> 00:29:24,400
Speaker 1: What you wish for goes on its way. So so

502
00:29:24,600 --> 00:29:28,560
Speaker 1: I started rehearsals the next week. But Jimmy Ryan, who

503
00:29:28,560 --> 00:29:32,400
Speaker 1: became my guitarist for many, many years, and Paul Glance,

504
00:29:33,000 --> 00:29:35,920
Speaker 1: a friend of Jimmy's, and the three of us rehearsed

505
00:29:35,920 --> 00:29:37,440
Speaker 1: in New York for three days, and then we went

506
00:29:37,440 --> 00:29:40,600
Speaker 1: out to l A rehearsed with Russ for one day.

507
00:29:40,720 --> 00:29:43,880
Speaker 1: And by that time I hopen open for Cats seven,

508
00:29:44,640 --> 00:29:49,120
Speaker 1: six April six. Yes, and that changed things for you.

509
00:29:49,360 --> 00:29:54,080
Speaker 1: That was that. That was a convincing night. We played

510
00:29:54,640 --> 00:29:57,320
Speaker 1: two shows every night and four shows on the weekend.

511
00:29:57,960 --> 00:30:00,600
Speaker 1: I met all all kinds of people. It was like

512
00:30:01,160 --> 00:30:04,840
Speaker 1: the lights were shining on me. I couldn't I couldn't

513
00:30:04,960 --> 00:30:07,480
Speaker 1: say no at that point. And I and even though

514
00:30:07,640 --> 00:30:10,840
Speaker 1: I was suffering tremendous stage fright, I had various things

515
00:30:10,840 --> 00:30:13,640
Speaker 1: that tricked me out of being afraid did you move

516
00:30:13,680 --> 00:30:15,640
Speaker 1: to l A? No? No, No, you never lived in

517
00:30:15,760 --> 00:30:18,080
Speaker 1: l A? No? Why well? I lived in l A

518
00:30:18,200 --> 00:30:21,000
Speaker 1: for various when when James and I got married, we

519
00:30:21,040 --> 00:30:24,000
Speaker 1: lived in l A to make certain records there. But

520
00:30:24,280 --> 00:30:27,480
Speaker 1: you visited or did you visited? We rented houses. In fact,

521
00:30:27,480 --> 00:30:31,400
Speaker 1: the house that bought after him we lived in. Yes.

522
00:30:31,600 --> 00:30:34,800
Speaker 1: Did he like l A? Did James like? I think

523
00:30:34,800 --> 00:30:40,760
Speaker 1: we both found it agreeable and and it was convenient

524
00:30:40,840 --> 00:30:44,040
Speaker 1: while we were recording. Studios were right there l A too.

525
00:30:44,480 --> 00:30:47,720
Speaker 1: Sally was actually both the kids were just brand new

526
00:30:48,040 --> 00:30:50,720
Speaker 1: and were able to be with. We could take them

527
00:30:50,720 --> 00:30:53,680
Speaker 1: to the studio and there was no school to be involved.

528
00:30:53,720 --> 00:30:55,680
Speaker 1: You know, it was it was, It was great. It

529
00:30:55,760 --> 00:30:57,440
Speaker 1: was really great the years that Where did he like

530
00:30:57,560 --> 00:31:00,680
Speaker 1: to live? What was home to him? Martha's Vineyard? Yeah,

531
00:31:00,720 --> 00:31:03,719
Speaker 1: that's home to him. He was mostly comfortable there, it was, Yeah,

532
00:31:03,720 --> 00:31:07,720
Speaker 1: but he's most comfortable there, not in New Yorker either. No, No,

533
00:31:07,800 --> 00:31:09,880
Speaker 1: I don't think either of us were really And we

534
00:31:10,000 --> 00:31:11,920
Speaker 1: kept on trying to figure out what to do all

535
00:31:11,960 --> 00:31:14,320
Speaker 1: the time in New York. We neither of us really

536
00:31:14,400 --> 00:31:17,560
Speaker 1: knew what to do. How did poaching Kunkle for your

537
00:31:17,560 --> 00:31:20,840
Speaker 1: recordings in l A lead you to and you don't

538
00:31:20,840 --> 00:31:22,080
Speaker 1: have to talk about this if you don't want to.

539
00:31:22,120 --> 00:31:27,640
Speaker 1: Your first marriage, well, I met James the first night

540
00:31:28,040 --> 00:31:31,160
Speaker 1: that I was performing at at the Troubador. He came

541
00:31:31,600 --> 00:31:34,400
Speaker 1: backstage into the dressing room too, I don't know, see

542
00:31:34,440 --> 00:31:37,440
Speaker 1: Russ or see me or whatever, and he was just

543
00:31:37,520 --> 00:31:40,400
Speaker 1: kind of sitting sitting there in the corner until Joni

544
00:31:40,480 --> 00:31:43,080
Speaker 1: Mitchell came in and said, come on, James, we have

545
00:31:43,120 --> 00:31:46,040
Speaker 1: to leave now. So that's the first time I actually

546
00:31:46,080 --> 00:31:48,560
Speaker 1: met James. Even though we passed and met a couple

547
00:31:48,560 --> 00:31:51,560
Speaker 1: of times on the vineyard in a peripheral kind of

548
00:31:51,560 --> 00:31:54,800
Speaker 1: way as youngsters, as as very young kids, we've met

549
00:31:55,760 --> 00:31:58,920
Speaker 1: his family had been up. And then how soon after

550
00:31:58,960 --> 00:32:01,520
Speaker 1: that did you get married? Well, then we we met.

551
00:32:02,040 --> 00:32:06,560
Speaker 1: After that, we met the following Thanksgiving. Well, the Thanksgiving

552
00:32:08,280 --> 00:32:10,880
Speaker 1: I went to his show at Carnegie Hall and I

553
00:32:10,920 --> 00:32:16,160
Speaker 1: went backstage in between acts and I said to him,

554
00:32:16,360 --> 00:32:18,440
Speaker 1: you know, we we said hi again and how are

555
00:32:18,480 --> 00:32:21,120
Speaker 1: you and it was just, you know, it was in

556
00:32:21,160 --> 00:32:25,160
Speaker 1: between the show and everybody was drinking beer and James's

557
00:32:25,240 --> 00:32:27,720
Speaker 1: band was hanging out and James said, and I said

558
00:32:27,720 --> 00:32:29,360
Speaker 1: to James, you know, if you're ever in New York

559
00:32:29,400 --> 00:32:31,880
Speaker 1: and you want a home cooked meal, please please give

560
00:32:31,920 --> 00:32:34,880
Speaker 1: me a call, and he said, how about tonight, And

561
00:32:34,960 --> 00:32:37,200
Speaker 1: so that was That was the first of many home

562
00:32:37,240 --> 00:32:42,320
Speaker 1: cooked meals. There's one big home cooked and one large

563
00:32:42,360 --> 00:32:46,480
Speaker 1: home cooked meal. I'm sure with someone who is as

564
00:32:46,600 --> 00:32:50,480
Speaker 1: talented as you, and it made so much music as

565
00:32:50,520 --> 00:32:53,440
Speaker 1: you have so much great music, someone who's as gifted

566
00:32:53,480 --> 00:32:56,320
Speaker 1: as you, there must be countless moments like that. But

567
00:32:56,400 --> 00:32:59,120
Speaker 1: share one with us when you were doing it, when

568
00:32:59,160 --> 00:33:01,920
Speaker 1: you're in a studio or you're performing, or you're doing

569
00:33:01,960 --> 00:33:04,680
Speaker 1: a duet with somebody, something in your life as a

570
00:33:04,760 --> 00:33:08,120
Speaker 1: musician that it just sticks with you was like, this

571
00:33:08,200 --> 00:33:12,120
Speaker 1: is it, this is what it's all about. There's so

572
00:33:12,320 --> 00:33:15,200
Speaker 1: I'm very lucky that so much comes to my mind.

573
00:33:15,760 --> 00:33:17,920
Speaker 1: That it's very hard to pick up one because there

574
00:33:18,080 --> 00:33:23,239
Speaker 1: there are many many. Um which one do you want?

575
00:33:23,240 --> 00:33:25,920
Speaker 1: You choose? Give me one from give me a hint.

576
00:33:26,240 --> 00:33:28,400
Speaker 1: We'll give me one from when you did the songbook,

577
00:33:28,400 --> 00:33:32,400
Speaker 1: when you did the Sanders album. Stephen came to the

578
00:33:32,440 --> 00:33:35,880
Speaker 1: studio to the recording studio while I was recording it,

579
00:33:35,960 --> 00:33:40,000
Speaker 1: which was live with an orchestra, Not a Day goes By,

580
00:33:40,080 --> 00:33:43,760
Speaker 1: and I was pretty tense. That Stephen Sondheim, the Great

581
00:33:43,800 --> 00:33:46,280
Speaker 1: Stephen Snheim, who had written the song that I was singing,

582
00:33:46,920 --> 00:33:49,880
Speaker 1: was in the studio very proprietary, but his material, yes.

583
00:33:50,160 --> 00:33:52,880
Speaker 1: And so I was in the in the vocal booth,

584
00:33:53,360 --> 00:33:56,120
Speaker 1: and there's a little window in a vocal booth, and

585
00:33:56,200 --> 00:33:58,360
Speaker 1: so I wanted to avoid the window because he could

586
00:33:58,400 --> 00:34:01,720
Speaker 1: see me through the window. So I hunched down on

587
00:34:01,880 --> 00:34:03,680
Speaker 1: my knees. I got down on my knees and did

588
00:34:03,720 --> 00:34:06,600
Speaker 1: the vocal sitting on my knees in a in a

589
00:34:07,000 --> 00:34:09,600
Speaker 1: in a slightly compromising position because I just had to

590
00:34:09,680 --> 00:34:12,520
Speaker 1: hunch down. And then I got up at and it

591
00:34:12,600 --> 00:34:15,840
Speaker 1: was a fairly I thought it was, under the circumstances,

592
00:34:15,880 --> 00:34:19,320
Speaker 1: a pretty pretty good vocal. And I got up afterward,

593
00:34:19,840 --> 00:34:22,200
Speaker 1: and I walked back into the control room and his

594
00:34:22,320 --> 00:34:27,800
Speaker 1: head was in his hands and he was weeping with

595
00:34:27,800 --> 00:34:30,640
Speaker 1: with tears of gladness. I'm happy to say, what a

596
00:34:30,719 --> 00:34:36,120
Speaker 1: wonderful thing. Oh God, that's that's pretty heraldic. Not a

597
00:34:36,280 --> 00:34:49,320
Speaker 1: day goes by, not a thing, but coming up. Carly

598
00:34:49,480 --> 00:34:53,560
Speaker 1: Simon talks about the roots of her stage fright. I

599
00:34:53,680 --> 00:34:56,680
Speaker 1: talked to another musician from New York, this one from

600
00:34:56,760 --> 00:35:01,560
Speaker 1: Queen's who also defined his generation people who weren't prepared

601
00:35:01,680 --> 00:35:06,120
Speaker 1: for for what it is that I was in the

602
00:35:06,160 --> 00:35:09,080
Speaker 1: world that I came from. Nobody nobody said, well, will

603
00:35:09,120 --> 00:35:12,479
Speaker 1: you make your living as an artist? But that wasn't

604
00:35:12,480 --> 00:35:17,759
Speaker 1: it possibility? Certainly, you can make your living as a

605
00:35:17,840 --> 00:35:26,279
Speaker 1: rock and roll artist. And I mean forget about like

606
00:35:26,400 --> 00:35:30,279
Speaker 1: the greatest songwriters or something like that, just even a songwriter.

607
00:35:30,960 --> 00:35:34,280
Speaker 1: Take a listen to my entire conversation with Paul Simon

608
00:35:34,680 --> 00:35:39,720
Speaker 1: at Here's the Thing dot Org. This is Alec Baldwin

609
00:35:39,960 --> 00:35:43,359
Speaker 1: and you're listening to Here's the Thing. Carly Simon has

610
00:35:43,440 --> 00:35:47,000
Speaker 1: earned every bit of fame she's achieved, but one could

611
00:35:47,080 --> 00:35:51,440
Speaker 1: argue she was destined for stardom. Her childhood was peppered

612
00:35:51,480 --> 00:35:56,320
Speaker 1: with remarkable characters. Albert Einstein at the dinner table, Jackie

613
00:35:56,360 --> 00:36:00,239
Speaker 1: Robinson playing second bass in her backyard. As a grow up,

614
00:36:00,360 --> 00:36:05,680
Speaker 1: she amassed her own exceptional circle of friends. One spontaneous

615
00:36:05,719 --> 00:36:08,600
Speaker 1: evening that I will never forget I was lucky enough

616
00:36:08,640 --> 00:36:11,640
Speaker 1: to count myself among them. I get the call from Jim,

617
00:36:11,719 --> 00:36:16,320
Speaker 1: your ex husband, Jim Hart, and Jim calls me and says, now, Carly,

618
00:36:16,440 --> 00:36:18,880
Speaker 1: and I I would love you to come to the

619
00:36:18,920 --> 00:36:21,160
Speaker 1: house and we're gonna have a quick El Fresco meal.

620
00:36:21,200 --> 00:36:24,040
Speaker 1: Don't be late. It'll be you and Carly and I

621
00:36:24,280 --> 00:36:26,600
Speaker 1: and a mystery guest. And I get to the house

622
00:36:26,640 --> 00:36:29,759
Speaker 1: and you know who shows up. And I'm apoplectic, you know,

623
00:36:29,760 --> 00:36:31,840
Speaker 1: I mean, I was beside myself. I don't know what

624
00:36:31,880 --> 00:36:36,239
Speaker 1: to say because she turned me Jacqueline Kennedy, and she said,

625
00:36:36,239 --> 00:36:41,600
Speaker 1: to me, so tell me about acting. She said, I

626
00:36:41,680 --> 00:36:43,799
Speaker 1: want you to talk to me about acting. Was my

627
00:36:43,880 --> 00:36:48,520
Speaker 1: son John is very interested in acting? And literally I

628
00:36:48,520 --> 00:36:50,880
Speaker 1: remember looking at going you want me to talk to

629
00:36:50,920 --> 00:36:54,560
Speaker 1: you about acting? I said, you're kidding, right? And now then,

630
00:36:54,600 --> 00:36:57,480
Speaker 1: how could this be possible? But did you feel you're

631
00:36:57,560 --> 00:37:00,880
Speaker 1: friends with the former First Lady of United States, one

632
00:37:00,880 --> 00:37:03,879
Speaker 1: of the most famous women that ever lived, and other

633
00:37:03,920 --> 00:37:07,200
Speaker 1: friendships of yours that I've known, Mike and Diane, you

634
00:37:07,239 --> 00:37:10,600
Speaker 1: were very friend with Nichols and his wife? And uh

635
00:37:11,160 --> 00:37:13,239
Speaker 1: is that easier for you? Did you find in your

636
00:37:13,280 --> 00:37:15,680
Speaker 1: life that is your life progressed for you? Was it

637
00:37:15,680 --> 00:37:17,520
Speaker 1: easier to be friends with people who had the same

638
00:37:17,600 --> 00:37:20,920
Speaker 1: kind of issue, have fame and so farther as you did?

639
00:37:21,080 --> 00:37:24,279
Speaker 1: I don't think so. I don't think that really had

640
00:37:24,400 --> 00:37:26,919
Speaker 1: very much to do with it. I mean, I met

641
00:37:27,040 --> 00:37:31,239
Speaker 1: Jackie originally because of the book idea that she had

642
00:37:31,320 --> 00:37:34,000
Speaker 1: and because she was working in that business, she was

643
00:37:34,040 --> 00:37:35,759
Speaker 1: working at Double Day. But I also met her on

644
00:37:35,800 --> 00:37:39,760
Speaker 1: the vineyard before, at a party at the Styrons and

645
00:37:40,200 --> 00:37:43,480
Speaker 1: Bill and Rose Stein's, who see, the vineyard has a

646
00:37:43,520 --> 00:37:48,080
Speaker 1: population that includes a lot of great sort of literary figures,

647
00:37:48,680 --> 00:37:53,320
Speaker 1: Bill Styron and Art buck Wall, John Hersey and Mike Wallace.

648
00:37:53,960 --> 00:37:56,480
Speaker 1: Lilian Hellman was actually the first of those people, and

649
00:37:56,520 --> 00:38:00,279
Speaker 1: she she probably attracted the Styron's up there, and it

650
00:38:00,400 --> 00:38:03,880
Speaker 1: just became an enclave that particular area of the vineyard.

651
00:38:04,440 --> 00:38:07,360
Speaker 1: And so when James and I got married, we were

652
00:38:07,400 --> 00:38:10,840
Speaker 1: we were half in that scene and half in the carpenters,

653
00:38:10,880 --> 00:38:13,120
Speaker 1: just the people who were who were building our house,

654
00:38:13,160 --> 00:38:16,600
Speaker 1: and we played volleyball without on the lawn and went

655
00:38:16,640 --> 00:38:19,719
Speaker 1: clamming with and but there was a kind of a

656
00:38:19,800 --> 00:38:24,120
Speaker 1: nice melange of of those two groups, and James and

657
00:38:24,120 --> 00:38:27,600
Speaker 1: I weren't were not the only people who straddled both sides.

658
00:38:27,880 --> 00:38:30,600
Speaker 1: Because because I don't necessarily think it's easier to be

659
00:38:30,760 --> 00:38:33,839
Speaker 1: with celebrities. I think if you have friends, I mean,

660
00:38:34,160 --> 00:38:35,719
Speaker 1: in the first place, I think it's very hard to

661
00:38:35,800 --> 00:38:40,359
Speaker 1: make friends past the age of thirty. That's um. I

662
00:38:40,440 --> 00:38:43,399
Speaker 1: find that that a lot of the celebrity friends that

663
00:38:43,719 --> 00:38:48,880
Speaker 1: that I've made because the attraction of the similar, similar

664
00:38:48,920 --> 00:38:53,200
Speaker 1: celebrities attract or something don't don't you, or they're they're

665
00:38:53,239 --> 00:38:56,959
Speaker 1: they're they're not they're not wholesome in a certain way.

666
00:38:57,080 --> 00:38:59,680
Speaker 1: And it's a little bit like being with the record company.

667
00:38:59,719 --> 00:39:02,720
Speaker 1: When you don't have a successful record, and the first

668
00:39:02,760 --> 00:39:05,279
Speaker 1: record that you've had that's that's really successful, you get

669
00:39:05,280 --> 00:39:08,960
Speaker 1: a first throw for your bed, you know, and then

670
00:39:09,719 --> 00:39:11,560
Speaker 1: the next one you haven't done that well, and you

671
00:39:11,600 --> 00:39:16,520
Speaker 1: get a Cartier pen and then then finally you you've

672
00:39:16,560 --> 00:39:19,000
Speaker 1: really dropped off the charts, and you get like a

673
00:39:19,000 --> 00:39:22,640
Speaker 1: little basket that's filled with with shredded paper and a

674
00:39:22,719 --> 00:39:26,880
Speaker 1: shampoo from Keels, And so in that way, it's a

675
00:39:26,960 --> 00:39:29,319
Speaker 1: little bit when you're sort of courting the friendship of

676
00:39:29,400 --> 00:39:31,560
Speaker 1: somebody that you're a new friend with and you're so

677
00:39:31,600 --> 00:39:34,319
Speaker 1: excited that you've made this friend who you've admired from

678
00:39:34,320 --> 00:39:38,040
Speaker 1: afar for so long, and you sort of you court

679
00:39:38,080 --> 00:39:42,480
Speaker 1: them with attention and things that don't don't continue as

680
00:39:42,520 --> 00:39:44,560
Speaker 1: you get to know them, or they or they offend

681
00:39:44,640 --> 00:39:47,480
Speaker 1: you once, or there's a falling out, or there's a

682
00:39:47,520 --> 00:39:51,440
Speaker 1: there's a disruption, or there's a jealousy, or there's something,

683
00:39:51,560 --> 00:39:54,440
Speaker 1: and then then there's a you know, the first year

684
00:39:54,480 --> 00:39:57,399
Speaker 1: of courting, there's there's there's a great gift. Now I'm

685
00:39:57,400 --> 00:39:59,680
Speaker 1: talking about the metaphor of a gift because it can

686
00:39:59,719 --> 00:40:02,279
Speaker 1: come in all different ways. And then and then it

687
00:40:02,400 --> 00:40:08,200
Speaker 1: decreases down to, you know, the Santa Claus slippers, and

688
00:40:08,440 --> 00:40:10,880
Speaker 1: there's not there's there's there's a kind of a feeling

689
00:40:10,920 --> 00:40:13,200
Speaker 1: that you're only as good as your last present from

690
00:40:13,280 --> 00:40:18,160
Speaker 1: them is, and and you're so easily you're so easily

691
00:40:18,200 --> 00:40:21,280
Speaker 1: wounded by things that they do, or if they don't

692
00:40:21,560 --> 00:40:24,160
Speaker 1: write you as long an email back as you've written

693
00:40:24,160 --> 00:40:26,720
Speaker 1: to them, you know, you count the number of lines

694
00:40:26,760 --> 00:40:28,879
Speaker 1: that you've written here, I wrote this whole long letter

695
00:40:28,920 --> 00:40:31,080
Speaker 1: about what you meant to me and all the things

696
00:40:31,080 --> 00:40:33,480
Speaker 1: we did together. And then they answer you back saying

697
00:40:33,760 --> 00:40:38,200
Speaker 1: I'll file that away. Love. You know, I find that

698
00:40:38,280 --> 00:40:41,799
Speaker 1: for me. I'm remarried, and I've got little kids, and

699
00:40:41,840 --> 00:40:43,480
Speaker 1: I've got a three year old or one and a

700
00:40:43,520 --> 00:40:45,560
Speaker 1: half year old and a five month old. I've got

701
00:40:45,560 --> 00:40:48,440
Speaker 1: three You've had three kids in three and a half years.

702
00:40:49,000 --> 00:40:53,600
Speaker 1: I have exactly what I wanted. But my friends fall

703
00:40:53,640 --> 00:40:56,640
Speaker 1: off because I've had this choice and these I've got

704
00:40:56,680 --> 00:40:59,400
Speaker 1: my kids. My wife is my dear friend. What about

705
00:40:59,440 --> 00:41:02,160
Speaker 1: friends from high school? I'm in touch with one guy

706
00:41:02,160 --> 00:41:05,239
Speaker 1: from high school and he lives in Norman, Oklahoma. But

707
00:41:05,320 --> 00:41:07,680
Speaker 1: I'm not in high school. Like I said in my book,

708
00:41:07,880 --> 00:41:11,319
Speaker 1: high school was a skin that I shed. All I

709
00:41:11,400 --> 00:41:14,520
Speaker 1: care about is now, can you discipline yourself to that degree?

710
00:41:14,960 --> 00:41:19,279
Speaker 1: It just happened to me automatically. Don't they refer to

711
00:41:19,360 --> 00:41:25,560
Speaker 1: the best? Um? I just don't want those things to

712
00:41:25,640 --> 00:41:31,080
Speaker 1: intrude sometimes like I cancel. I mean this, the smells,

713
00:41:31,200 --> 00:41:36,320
Speaker 1: the things that you eat, the the sensory, those beautiful

714
00:41:36,440 --> 00:41:39,320
Speaker 1: things and good things, you know. I mean. I walked

715
00:41:39,360 --> 00:41:44,719
Speaker 1: around after a very corrosive custody battle, and even when

716
00:41:44,719 --> 00:41:47,319
Speaker 1: I thought I it had subsided, I'd be having dinner

717
00:41:47,360 --> 00:41:51,279
Speaker 1: with somebody who they'd mentioned themselves, or someone close to

718
00:41:51,320 --> 00:41:54,680
Speaker 1: them whose circumstances mirrored mind, and it would come right

719
00:41:54,719 --> 00:41:56,880
Speaker 1: back to me. If you could see the sparks coming

720
00:41:56,880 --> 00:41:59,520
Speaker 1: off my fingertips. I was so charged. What about all

721
00:41:59,520 --> 00:42:03,319
Speaker 1: the good things too. I mean that's different, but so

722
00:42:03,480 --> 00:42:06,040
Speaker 1: but how can you how can how can you segregate

723
00:42:06,080 --> 00:42:09,360
Speaker 1: them to that degree? It's just it's just how do

724
00:42:09,400 --> 00:42:13,319
Speaker 1: you write a song? Well, that's how do you sing

725
00:42:13,440 --> 00:42:15,759
Speaker 1: the way you do? It's a talent. I have to

726
00:42:15,800 --> 00:42:22,640
Speaker 1: take my feelings. I can't. I can't. I can't explagate

727
00:42:22,680 --> 00:42:24,359
Speaker 1: in the same way that you seem to be able to.

728
00:42:25,320 --> 00:42:28,000
Speaker 1: I mean, I I write about things that I feel,

729
00:42:28,080 --> 00:42:31,279
Speaker 1: and the past and the present and the possibly the

730
00:42:31,280 --> 00:42:37,080
Speaker 1: future merge. And I can't possibly tell you that that

731
00:42:37,280 --> 00:42:39,120
Speaker 1: my past isn't just as much a part of my

732
00:42:39,200 --> 00:42:43,200
Speaker 1: present as my present. I mean, it is your your

733
00:42:43,440 --> 00:42:49,239
Speaker 1: your combination, your wholeness becomes it's parts of like your

734
00:42:49,239 --> 00:42:54,719
Speaker 1: building blocks of your years. So for the person who

735
00:42:54,920 --> 00:42:59,360
Speaker 1: was preternaturally shy, it seems you don't really enjoy performing.

736
00:42:59,360 --> 00:43:02,560
Speaker 1: You've always are quoted as saying, what do you do?

737
00:43:02,600 --> 00:43:05,040
Speaker 1: I mean, as you have a preparation before you fly

738
00:43:05,120 --> 00:43:08,560
Speaker 1: on an airplane, was there a preparation before you performed live? Well,

739
00:43:08,840 --> 00:43:10,719
Speaker 1: you want to get back to the origins of why

740
00:43:10,840 --> 00:43:13,440
Speaker 1: I'm so afraid to be in the in the spotlight?

741
00:43:13,920 --> 00:43:15,880
Speaker 1: Or is that I mean because I had a terrible

742
00:43:15,880 --> 00:43:20,000
Speaker 1: stammer for for ever since I could talk. Your mother

743
00:43:20,040 --> 00:43:23,000
Speaker 1: told you to sing, so she told me yes. But

744
00:43:23,040 --> 00:43:25,040
Speaker 1: that didn't always work in school. I couldn't do that.

745
00:43:26,480 --> 00:43:29,319
Speaker 1: They didn't have butter at school, and so I I

746
00:43:29,520 --> 00:43:32,879
Speaker 1: um every time I was called upon in class, even

747
00:43:32,880 --> 00:43:36,239
Speaker 1: if I knew an answer, I couldn't say it. But

748
00:43:36,360 --> 00:43:38,319
Speaker 1: I didn't want to admit that I couldn't say it.

749
00:43:38,960 --> 00:43:41,880
Speaker 1: So the choice was to just pretend that I didn't

750
00:43:41,880 --> 00:43:45,680
Speaker 1: know it, or pretend or just go? Which would you do?

751
00:43:46,719 --> 00:43:49,160
Speaker 1: So I pretended that I didn't know the answer, and

752
00:43:49,200 --> 00:43:51,120
Speaker 1: then I I never wanted to be called upon, and

753
00:43:51,160 --> 00:43:56,120
Speaker 1: that and that just that just graduated to the same

754
00:43:56,160 --> 00:43:59,320
Speaker 1: thing in college. I mean, the same situation in class

755
00:43:59,320 --> 00:44:02,600
Speaker 1: in college, and the same situation. I am afraid to talk.

756
00:44:02,880 --> 00:44:05,319
Speaker 1: I am doing so now by the very skin of

757
00:44:05,360 --> 00:44:08,680
Speaker 1: my chinny, chin chin. Where is that? I'm mixed? I

758
00:44:08,760 --> 00:44:11,239
Speaker 1: miss mixed a metaphors. What was the preparation before you

759
00:44:11,239 --> 00:44:15,480
Speaker 1: would perform? Well, at least my band members would all

760
00:44:15,520 --> 00:44:19,680
Speaker 1: have to hit me, spank me. That's that was on

761
00:44:20,080 --> 00:44:23,000
Speaker 1: the couch again. No, that wasn't on the couch. That

762
00:44:23,080 --> 00:44:26,319
Speaker 1: was definitely and just before I go on stage, so

763
00:44:26,360 --> 00:44:32,919
Speaker 1: that the physical pain would would override the emotional struggle. Yes,

764
00:44:32,920 --> 00:44:35,920
Speaker 1: that's interesting, Yeah, just as when I mean, I was

765
00:44:35,960 --> 00:44:39,760
Speaker 1: once sitting with Stephen Sondheim on on a piano bench.

766
00:44:40,360 --> 00:44:44,120
Speaker 1: He was working on that show called Merrily, and I

767
00:44:44,160 --> 00:44:47,520
Speaker 1: was starting to have an anxiety attack and just getting

768
00:44:47,680 --> 00:44:51,319
Speaker 1: more and more um thinking that my heart was going

769
00:44:51,360 --> 00:44:53,200
Speaker 1: to beat out of my chest. I was so scared.

770
00:44:53,280 --> 00:44:55,120
Speaker 1: It wasn't there was no reason to be. I was

771
00:44:55,160 --> 00:44:58,080
Speaker 1: just having an anxiety attack, and so I pinched my

772
00:44:58,160 --> 00:45:01,360
Speaker 1: ear lobe, thinking that that the physical pain again would

773
00:45:01,400 --> 00:45:05,360
Speaker 1: distract me from the emotional fear. And the blood started

774
00:45:05,400 --> 00:45:09,000
Speaker 1: pouring out of my ear onto my white unto my

775
00:45:09,040 --> 00:45:13,240
Speaker 1: white shirt. So I mean, yeah, but I'll do anything

776
00:45:13,320 --> 00:45:17,120
Speaker 1: to avoid that mental pain that I remember. Johnny Ray

777
00:45:17,280 --> 00:45:19,520
Speaker 1: was a singer from this from the fifties who would

778
00:45:19,520 --> 00:45:22,839
Speaker 1: cry when he would sing, and I'm the same way.

779
00:45:23,040 --> 00:45:26,919
Speaker 1: There's some songs I can't get through, like what um, well,

780
00:45:27,040 --> 00:45:29,160
Speaker 1: just recently that's the way I've always heard it should be.

781
00:45:29,600 --> 00:45:31,600
Speaker 1: I was singing that for a group of people who

782
00:45:31,880 --> 00:45:33,120
Speaker 1: were trying to learn it because we were going to

783
00:45:33,160 --> 00:45:34,880
Speaker 1: do it for a concert on Martha's Vineyard, and I

784
00:45:34,880 --> 00:45:38,120
Speaker 1: got to the verse about you say, we'll soar like

785
00:45:38,200 --> 00:45:40,759
Speaker 1: two birds through the clouds, but soon you'll cage me

786
00:45:40,840 --> 00:45:42,680
Speaker 1: on your shelf. I'll never learn to be just me

787
00:45:42,800 --> 00:45:46,239
Speaker 1: first by myself, and I just it just all came

788
00:45:46,280 --> 00:45:50,360
Speaker 1: flooding back, all the feelings of being possessed and wanting

789
00:45:50,400 --> 00:45:53,359
Speaker 1: to possess and wanting to wanting to combine. You just

790
00:45:53,680 --> 00:45:56,200
Speaker 1: we're just sitting here as human being so much wanting

791
00:45:56,239 --> 00:45:59,400
Speaker 1: to merge, and yet we can't. And it's so frustrating

792
00:46:00,760 --> 00:46:04,280
Speaker 1: we can't. So we're sitting here. You mean you can't

793
00:46:04,320 --> 00:46:07,120
Speaker 1: and your you and that partner, or we meaning all

794
00:46:07,200 --> 00:46:10,600
Speaker 1: of us can't. All of us can't. Isn't amazing? Oh God,

795
00:46:10,760 --> 00:46:14,640
Speaker 1: there is such an authority on love. There are times

796
00:46:14,680 --> 00:46:16,759
Speaker 1: that there are times so sorry I asked you to

797
00:46:16,800 --> 00:46:19,480
Speaker 1: come here. And now. One of the things that that

798
00:46:19,480 --> 00:46:24,320
Speaker 1: that does make you blend more easily, that acts as

799
00:46:24,360 --> 00:46:28,640
Speaker 1: a as a lubricant to being able to pass yourself

800
00:46:28,680 --> 00:46:32,000
Speaker 1: to another person is music. And it is the thing

801
00:46:32,080 --> 00:46:35,000
Speaker 1: that is the common denominator. Is something that you listen

802
00:46:35,080 --> 00:46:36,840
Speaker 1: to at the same time you feel at the same

803
00:46:36,840 --> 00:46:40,360
Speaker 1: time you It goes through your body at the same time,

804
00:46:40,640 --> 00:46:46,520
Speaker 1: the vibrations the actual vibrations you are felt in your body,

805
00:46:46,680 --> 00:46:50,400
Speaker 1: and and that's a way to emerge. That's certainly was

806
00:46:50,480 --> 00:46:53,439
Speaker 1: my way of merging, because that's something that I could do.

807
00:46:53,920 --> 00:46:56,320
Speaker 1: But merging together when when James and I used to

808
00:46:56,360 --> 00:46:59,200
Speaker 1: sing together, that was about as great as it got.

809
00:46:59,400 --> 00:47:02,160
Speaker 1: You thought that way? Or yes, absolutely, he felt that way.

810
00:47:02,239 --> 00:47:03,840
Speaker 1: Do you think he dug doing them with you too?

811
00:47:04,280 --> 00:47:06,080
Speaker 1: I don't tell you. I don't know what. Do you

812
00:47:06,360 --> 00:47:08,880
Speaker 1: how he felt with you? He's pretty reticent. Yeah, he

813
00:47:09,320 --> 00:47:13,400
Speaker 1: wouldn't say that, but my my my kids would and do,

814
00:47:13,640 --> 00:47:16,920
Speaker 1: and I sing with them and we are as one

815
00:47:16,960 --> 00:47:20,960
Speaker 1: when we sing. My uncle he would always end everything

816
00:47:20,960 --> 00:47:24,600
Speaker 1: that he did with this song called look at the

817
00:47:24,600 --> 00:47:26,919
Speaker 1: blue Birds and the blackbirds. Do you know that song?

818
00:47:28,440 --> 00:47:30,080
Speaker 1: I don't know why I thought of it, but but

819
00:47:30,400 --> 00:47:33,120
Speaker 1: I'm gonna sing it if I remember it. Look at

820
00:47:33,120 --> 00:47:35,520
Speaker 1: my doorstep, look at my doorstep, Look at the blue birds,

821
00:47:35,520 --> 00:47:37,239
Speaker 1: look at the blackbirds, look at the good luck, look

822
00:47:37,239 --> 00:47:38,799
Speaker 1: at the bad luck, look at the good duck and

823
00:47:38,800 --> 00:47:41,440
Speaker 1: the bad luck. There we never knew bluebirds, knew any blackbirds,

824
00:47:41,440 --> 00:47:43,920
Speaker 1: never knew blackbirds knew any bluebirds, never good luck ever

825
00:47:44,000 --> 00:47:48,400
Speaker 1: to perch out there. I overheard boom boom boom, those

826
00:47:48,440 --> 00:47:52,239
Speaker 1: birdies talking boom boom, boom boom, And this is what

827
00:47:52,320 --> 00:47:58,400
Speaker 1: they had to say. Now, first the bluebirds saying, you

828
00:47:58,520 --> 00:48:05,040
Speaker 1: gotta have Sonny, you wearther. So the bluebirds and the

829
00:48:05,120 --> 00:48:11,040
Speaker 1: blackbirds got to getther. And then the blackbirds said, we're

830
00:48:11,080 --> 00:48:16,560
Speaker 1: birds of a different fairther. So the bluebirds and the

831
00:48:16,640 --> 00:48:22,640
Speaker 1: blackbirds got to getther. Well, when they talked it over,

832
00:48:23,080 --> 00:48:26,000
Speaker 1: they let the blackbirds bring the rain, and then the

833
00:48:26,040 --> 00:48:31,279
Speaker 1: bluebirds all agreed to bring the sunshine again. But you

834
00:48:31,360 --> 00:48:37,879
Speaker 1: can't have rain of sunshine that lasts forever. You can

835
00:48:37,920 --> 00:48:41,400
Speaker 1: take those bluebirds, you take those blackbirds, you put them together,

836
00:48:41,560 --> 00:48:44,879
Speaker 1: you get fair weather. And that's the reason the bluebirds

837
00:48:44,880 --> 00:48:51,719
Speaker 1: and the blackbirds got to getther. I did in his key,

838
00:48:51,840 --> 00:48:57,920
Speaker 1: not in mind, but what the hell live Jesus Martha's

839
00:48:58,000 --> 00:49:06,440
Speaker 1: vineyard zone Carly's son that thank you, thank you. After

840
00:49:06,680 --> 00:49:09,719
Speaker 1: our interview, I realized I still had a couple more

841
00:49:09,800 --> 00:49:15,680
Speaker 1: questions for Carly Simon, so I called her up. Hey, Alec,

842
00:49:16,560 --> 00:49:18,880
Speaker 1: who were the people who are your contemporaries, who you

843
00:49:18,960 --> 00:49:23,040
Speaker 1: worked with, who made the deepest impression on you? Um, well,

844
00:49:23,080 --> 00:49:31,280
Speaker 1: it would have to be certainly James Taylor. I mean why, Well,

845
00:49:31,400 --> 00:49:33,600
Speaker 1: before I met him, I listened to his music and

846
00:49:33,719 --> 00:49:40,319
Speaker 1: it stirred something very immediate and heartfelt and specific. I mean,

847
00:49:41,000 --> 00:49:44,000
Speaker 1: there was an arrow that was directly from him to me.

848
00:49:44,920 --> 00:49:48,440
Speaker 1: You know. One one of the things that the incredible

849
00:49:48,480 --> 00:49:52,239
Speaker 1: pain that I feel from not having that returned, you know,

850
00:49:52,440 --> 00:49:55,759
Speaker 1: from from not from not having that accepted in the

851
00:49:55,840 --> 00:50:00,520
Speaker 1: words that James will not talk to me. That that's

852
00:50:00,520 --> 00:50:03,000
Speaker 1: not that, that's not a mutual thing, and I don't

853
00:50:03,000 --> 00:50:06,239
Speaker 1: know why. And it's one of those things where you

854
00:50:06,280 --> 00:50:08,440
Speaker 1: have to you have to go on and live the

855
00:50:08,480 --> 00:50:12,400
Speaker 1: destiny of your life by yourself. His music had a

856
00:50:12,400 --> 00:50:16,080
Speaker 1: tremendous effect on me. Cat Stevens did too, because I

857
00:50:16,120 --> 00:50:19,240
Speaker 1: was listening to a lot of of his music around

858
00:50:19,280 --> 00:50:23,320
Speaker 1: that time. But then there was there were um all

859
00:50:23,360 --> 00:50:26,080
Speaker 1: all of the great musicals of the of the forties

860
00:50:26,120 --> 00:50:31,120
Speaker 1: and fifties, especially Guys and Dolls and Kiss Me Kate

861
00:50:32,200 --> 00:50:39,200
Speaker 1: at Brigadoon, South Pacific, um uh, you know I And

862
00:50:39,239 --> 00:50:41,680
Speaker 1: then there was the the operas like a Mall and

863
00:50:41,719 --> 00:50:46,680
Speaker 1: the night visitors like like the Manati operas. And because

864
00:50:46,680 --> 00:50:50,360
Speaker 1: there was so much music of different of different um

865
00:50:50,360 --> 00:50:53,040
Speaker 1: types going around, my house. Joey was the person who

866
00:50:53,120 --> 00:50:55,560
Speaker 1: brought in the classical music, but so in my father

867
00:50:55,760 --> 00:50:58,560
Speaker 1: because he played the you know, he he played such

868
00:50:58,680 --> 00:51:01,480
Speaker 1: a variety of classical music on the piano. And then

869
00:51:01,680 --> 00:51:03,959
Speaker 1: and then Joey was the opera singer, and she brought

870
00:51:04,000 --> 00:51:07,359
Speaker 1: that into the house and in that form. And and

871
00:51:07,400 --> 00:51:10,400
Speaker 1: then my mother was the one who primarily listened to

872
00:51:10,480 --> 00:51:13,680
Speaker 1: the to the theater music. But my uncle's were both

873
00:51:14,560 --> 00:51:19,759
Speaker 1: the founders of jazz magazines and and they they were,

874
00:51:19,880 --> 00:51:22,719
Speaker 1: you know, they were the ones that listened to Dave

875
00:51:22,760 --> 00:51:27,480
Speaker 1: Brubeck and and Lamberts, Hendricks and Ross and brought those people.

876
00:51:28,040 --> 00:51:32,439
Speaker 1: So there were there was a whole huge variety of

877
00:51:32,440 --> 00:51:37,640
Speaker 1: of visitors in my head of of all kinds of music.

878
00:51:37,680 --> 00:51:40,720
Speaker 1: I would say that that other than Polka's, I didn't

879
00:51:40,719 --> 00:51:45,000
Speaker 1: listen to a lot of Folcus And I didn't I

880
00:51:45,040 --> 00:51:49,080
Speaker 1: wasn't very much in the country music at that time either.

881
00:51:49,120 --> 00:51:53,040
Speaker 1: I mean, it wasn't it had hadn't made itself into mainstream.

882
00:51:53,120 --> 00:51:55,480
Speaker 1: But but yeah, I didn't. I didn't love the twang.

883
00:51:56,200 --> 00:52:00,160
Speaker 1: You see all these songs about love, thoughts about love,

884
00:52:00,280 --> 00:52:02,200
Speaker 1: or in so many of your songs, who's the love

885
00:52:02,239 --> 00:52:07,120
Speaker 1: of your life. Well, I guess my kids. But that

886
00:52:07,239 --> 00:52:12,000
Speaker 1: with that question, I think he probably understand that it's just, um,

887
00:52:12,040 --> 00:52:16,160
Speaker 1: it's it's breathtaking, how how much, how on a different,

888
00:52:16,560 --> 00:52:20,200
Speaker 1: on different level it exists, and but it teaches you

889
00:52:20,280 --> 00:52:23,279
Speaker 1: about it teaches you about a brand new level. And

890
00:52:23,280 --> 00:52:26,120
Speaker 1: and as far as romantic love, I don't I don't

891
00:52:26,160 --> 00:52:30,760
Speaker 1: necessarily want to go there because that doesn't necessarily last

892
00:52:30,920 --> 00:52:33,799
Speaker 1: as long as as as the as the other kind

893
00:52:33,800 --> 00:52:38,040
Speaker 1: of soul of I mean, I suppose there must be

894
00:52:38,120 --> 00:52:42,520
Speaker 1: some people who favor one child over another, and that

895
00:52:42,640 --> 00:52:46,279
Speaker 1: must be very hard for them to say, well that

896
00:52:46,320 --> 00:52:47,960
Speaker 1: it's both of my kids, with three of my kids,

897
00:52:48,000 --> 00:52:50,279
Speaker 1: when it's really only one. I don't know. I don't

898
00:52:50,280 --> 00:52:53,239
Speaker 1: have I haven't had that experience because because I love

899
00:52:53,320 --> 00:52:56,920
Speaker 1: my children equally and so much. In this this is

900
00:52:56,960 --> 00:53:03,160
Speaker 1: a lot left over. This is Alec Baldwin and you're

901
00:53:03,239 --> 00:53:04,520
Speaker 1: listening to. Here's the thing