Rufus Wainwright: “Shakespeare is one of the best lyricists I’ve ever worked with”

2023-04-20 13:22:59

Rufus Wainwrightthe not-so-new adult pop star, is back in these lands: tomorrow, at 9:00 p.m., he will be on the stage of the circus theater Murcia. Confessed megalomaniac, excessive by nature, theatrical, brilliant and funny, this showman no-nonsense, she flaunts feather boas on stage with the same ease with which she makes your hair stand on end when she sits at the piano and sings “I’m so sick of you, America.”

Born in Rhinebeck, New York and raised in Montreal, He is the son of musicians Loudon Wainwright III and Kate McGarrigle.. Every morning she woke up listening to her mother interpret Bach’s Goldberg Variations on the piano, and from there those marked influences, ranging from opera to French song, passing through the musical. His style could be described as baroque or chamber pop. The orchestral pomp and the scores written with one ear set on Verdi and the other on the music hall are not, however, the only confessable vices of an artist who also attends commissions from the Metropolitan Opera House in New York who embarks on a tribute to Leonard Cohen or transforms for three nights into Judy Garland to reproduce the concert that the actress and singer offered at Carnegie Hall in the ‘Big Apple’ in 1963. And it is that she has always shown her admiration for the ill-fated Dorothy from The Wizard of Ozincluding songs by the actress that usually top off her repertoire.

Last March, Rufus Wainwright announced the release of a new album, Folkocracy, which will be released on June 2, just before his 50th birthday. He defines it as “a return to his musical roots”, moving away from pop and operatic sounds to approach the folk of his parents. Probably only he could have brought Anohni, Nicole Scherzinger, David Byrne, Chaka Khan, Sheryl Crow and John Legend together on the same album.

Lyrical, epic, heartbreaking, solemn or intimate, a Rufus Wainwright concert provides one of the most intense experiences a music aficionado can witness. Elton John said of him: “He is the greatest singer-songwriter on the planet.” And it is that in his spectrum they enter from lullabies to puccinesque arias, and his shows are just as unclassifiable, for all audiences or for none.

He has surrounded himself with stars in Folkocracy, his cover album. What philosophy has guided this new album?

I come from two folk families, the McGarrigles and the Wainwrights, and I grew up with this music. My parents took it very seriously, but when I started my career I chose my own path; it used aspects of folk music, but I infused it with many other musical ideas. The song selection is very personal, but there are a lot of songwriters on the album that my parents really liked, like Peggy Seeger and Ewan MacColl, who even got married.

How did you choose your guests? Was the repertoire of the album agreed upon with them?

I only thought of singers that I admire. With some of them I had acted many times before, like my sisters or Anohni, even Brandi Carlile and Chaka Khan, but with others it was the first time, like with John Legend, Susanna Hoffs and Nicole Scherzinger. And as for the set list, I suggested to each one the song that I thought would be perfect for them, and most agreed immediately. Nicole Scherzinger, for example, was born in Hawaii and speaks Hawaiian, so she was the one to The flowers are famous. Brandi I thought she had the edged tone and intensity required for the ballad made popular by the Everly Brothers, and John’s voice was just right to embellish Heading for homePeggy Seeger.

Did Burt Bacharach leave you with some kind of void?

Of course. He considered him the greatest living American composer. I had the great pleasure of working with him a few times. His songs are absolutely perfect, and I sang some of them on a recent tour of the Netherlands with the Amsterdam Sinfonietta. He came to a show of mine at McCabe’s guitar store just before the pandemic.

Unfollow the rules It was a return to many things, wasn’t it? What rules do you have to stop following?

Anything that wastes your time. Time becomes so much more precious when you get older.

When he read the novel by Marguerite Yourcenar Hadrian’s Memoirs he was fascinated with the history of that emperor. How was the experience of creating his second opera? How do you take the fact that some critics are suspicious of his operas for being a pop artist?

Writing an opera is always a very intense experience. You have to surrender to the characters. Besides, Hadrian it was a much larger and more complex opera than its predecessor, Prima Donna; she needed that first experience to be able to write about a love story as deep as that of Hadrian and Antinous in the Roman Empire. About the critics… well, everyone has a right to an opinion, and a critic’s opinion is just as important as anyone else’s opinion. Hadrian It has already been presented in Toronto, at the Canadian Opera Company, and at the Teatro Real in Madrid, and at the Peralada festival, and there are many more performances to come. I feel blessed and happy that the opera companies find this piece worth producing, and the audience has been enthusiastic about the performances. I think there is something profoundly moving in Adriano’s story, that he realizes at the end of his life that his greatest achievement is having loved. I think it should be a message that we should all agree with, and an achievement that we should all aspire to.

Has writing opera changed you as a pop or folk writer? What have Shakespeare or Verdi to do with you?

I have always considered opera the secret ingredient in my way of composing pop music since day one. I fell in love with opera when I first heard the Requiem Verdi at the age of 13, and since then I have always channeled opera into my pop songs (the melodic sensibilities, the drama…). Great Art is timeless, and although these great artists use a different musical or verbal language than ours, the human condition and the emotions they speak of remain through the centuries. I find it very inspiring. Shakespeare is one of the best lyricists I’ve ever worked with!

Was Joni Mitchell very decisive in your artistic development, Rufus?

The truth is, they never let me listen to Joni Mitchell growing up, because my mom wasn’t a fan of hers; she thought that Joni was not pure folk. I think she was also a bit jealous of her success. I only began to appreciate her more when my husband Jorn took a great interest in her and organized two concerts of her for her seventy and seventy-fifth birthday in Toronto and Los Angeles. It’s been amazing getting to know her and singing with and for her during these shows. Her songs of course are incredible works of art, but I’m almost more impressed by her personality. There is something extremely majestic about her presence.

He has confessed that he is fascinated by classic Hollywood. What did she have before that she doesn’t have now? What does Judy Garland mean to you?

I think that today’s stars sometimes lack basic education for the show, such as dancing and singing. Old Hollywood movies told extraordinary things, and sometimes we need that in our little lives. Judy Garland had it all.

What do you think of the glorification of youth in pop culture? It seems to be intensifying to the max.

I appreciate youth culture, even if I am not one anymore, but it is good for young people to develop their own language. I like and dislike a lot of things, but the same goes for all kinds of art and culture. I recently joined Miley Cyrus on a song from her new album, Flowers, for a TV special she did, and I really appreciated her as a person and as an artist. She is authentic!

He is back in Spain. She has visited us many times, performing in theaters and festivals. What can we expect from the concerts on this tour? Will they be solo with his piano?

I love Spain and the Iberian Peninsula. The culture, the food and the people. I come solo, and I will play the piano and the guitar. Maybe I’ll try new material, and I want the audience to have a good time, but also to travel from heights to depths, from laughter to tears.

Date: Tomorrow, 9:00 p.m.

Place: Circus Theater, Murcia.

Precio: 20/28/38 euros.