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On Amy Farris
A note yesterday from an old Austin friend, whose daughter was among many violin students taught by the late Amy Farris, reminded me that I'd meant to write a little bit about Amy in yesterday's "Austin Afterthoughts" entry. As it happens, Austin's Continental Club has a show tonight in memory of Farris, with some pretty significant names paying their respects, including Dave Alvin, Kelly Willis, Exene Cervenka, Jon Dee Graham, and Jesse Dayton.
Amy's recent passing came up repeatedly last week in conversations with friends I ran into during my visit to Austin. It was clear that, although she'd moved to Los Angeles a few years back (so that Dave Alvin could produce her first record), she was still a valued member of the local community. That her death (at age 40) appears to have been a suicide after a lifelong struggle with manic depression seems out-of-sync with the Amy I knew, but then I really only knew her just a little bit, on the surface.
When we ran a Town & Country piece on Farris in our May-June 2004 issue (upon the Yep Roc release of her Alvin-produced disc Anyway), I wrote it myself; I'd been impressed with Amy's music over a few years of seeing her play violin with the likes of Kelly Willis and Bruce Robison and Alejandro Escovedo. (She also had a fair stint with country legend Ray Price.) On the couple of occasions when we'd conversed in Austin or Los Angeles, we'd bonded a little bit over having been among the increasingly rare Austin-music folks who'd actually grown up in Austin.
I went back over my 2004 interview with her this morning, wondering if there might have been some sort of hint at the sadder side of Amy I'd never been aware of. Mostly, there were lots of back-and-forth exchanges between us that just seemed to underscore how much she loved music, and being part of the community of musicians she had gotten to know. We talked about how we both played violin in junior-high orchestra (unlike me, she continued into high school, and excelled), and how we both had parents who were inclined toward classical rather than pop music. We mulled over the irony of growing up in Austin at the height of the outlaw-country boom, and neither of us being quite old enough to have any clue about it: "I know, I know. We missed the Armadillo!", Amy lamented.
Kind of hidden in the midst of our discussions about her time writing and recording with Dave Alvin for her solo debut, there's maybe a small sign of the inner despair that was part of who she was. "We were sitting in Dave’s backyard, and we were working on some songs, and I was thinking about recording one of his songs. I was thinking about recording 'Blue Boulevard', because for some reason, songs about streets, and songs about emptiness and things, were hitting me really hard. And some of my own songs have those themes."
Not to read too much into that; pretty much any singer-songwriter worth a lick has songs about darker feelings and emotions. But probably there was something more to those words than I realized at the time of our interview. She came back to that theme when we discussed her cover of Scott Walker's "Big Louise", the next-to-last track on Anyway:
“Well, that was a song that I had been in love with for a long time. That song, to me, first of all, it deals with emptiness, a lot, as well. It hits me on a lot of levels. First, it terrifies me. It’s the future that no one wants. And, it also makes me think of Holly Golightly, in Breakfast At Tiffany’s, if things didn’t go right for her. You know, there’s a line -- 'You can hear her hum softly from a fire escape in the sky' -- and there’s that scene in the movie with Audrey Hepburn on the fire escape. And the thing is, Audrey Hepburn was gonna get old, you know, and what would happen then?"
It's the song's chorus that hits the hardest, looking back now: "Didn't time sound sweet yesterday? In a world filled with friends, you lose your way."
Although Farris didn't end up recording Alvin's "Blue Boulevard", the consideration of it led them to an old X tune which became a highlight of Anyway. "We were working on that ('Blue Boulevard'), and we were playing it, and then Dave goes, 'Do you know "Poor Girl"?' And I’m like, (laughs) 'Yeah. Every word!' And I sang the whole thing for him. And so we recorded that."
A few of its lyrics, perhaps, speak to where Amy traveled -- and to the notion that perhaps we should seek to remember her most for the good she brought to those around her, in the time that she had:
Life turned and wandered
Never to come back again
Take what she gives you
And don't feel sorry for her....
(Amy with Dave Alvin & the Guilty Women in Connecticut in July 2009,
joining Christy McWilson on Christy's song "Potter's Field")
Amy's recent passing came up repeatedly last week in conversations with friends I ran into during my visit to Austin. It was clear that, although she'd moved to Los Angeles a few years back (so that Dave Alvin could produce her first record), she was still a valued member of the local community. That her death (at age 40) appears to have been a suicide after a lifelong struggle with manic depression seems out-of-sync with the Amy I knew, but then I really only knew her just a little bit, on the surface.
When we ran a Town & Country piece on Farris in our May-June 2004 issue (upon the Yep Roc release of her Alvin-produced disc Anyway), I wrote it myself; I'd been impressed with Amy's music over a few years of seeing her play violin with the likes of Kelly Willis and Bruce Robison and Alejandro Escovedo. (She also had a fair stint with country legend Ray Price.) On the couple of occasions when we'd conversed in Austin or Los Angeles, we'd bonded a little bit over having been among the increasingly rare Austin-music folks who'd actually grown up in Austin.
I went back over my 2004 interview with her this morning, wondering if there might have been some sort of hint at the sadder side of Amy I'd never been aware of. Mostly, there were lots of back-and-forth exchanges between us that just seemed to underscore how much she loved music, and being part of the community of musicians she had gotten to know. We talked about how we both played violin in junior-high orchestra (unlike me, she continued into high school, and excelled), and how we both had parents who were inclined toward classical rather than pop music. We mulled over the irony of growing up in Austin at the height of the outlaw-country boom, and neither of us being quite old enough to have any clue about it: "I know, I know. We missed the Armadillo!", Amy lamented.
Kind of hidden in the midst of our discussions about her time writing and recording with Dave Alvin for her solo debut, there's maybe a small sign of the inner despair that was part of who she was. "We were sitting in Dave’s backyard, and we were working on some songs, and I was thinking about recording one of his songs. I was thinking about recording 'Blue Boulevard', because for some reason, songs about streets, and songs about emptiness and things, were hitting me really hard. And some of my own songs have those themes."
Not to read too much into that; pretty much any singer-songwriter worth a lick has songs about darker feelings and emotions. But probably there was something more to those words than I realized at the time of our interview. She came back to that theme when we discussed her cover of Scott Walker's "Big Louise", the next-to-last track on Anyway:
“Well, that was a song that I had been in love with for a long time. That song, to me, first of all, it deals with emptiness, a lot, as well. It hits me on a lot of levels. First, it terrifies me. It’s the future that no one wants. And, it also makes me think of Holly Golightly, in Breakfast At Tiffany’s, if things didn’t go right for her. You know, there’s a line -- 'You can hear her hum softly from a fire escape in the sky' -- and there’s that scene in the movie with Audrey Hepburn on the fire escape. And the thing is, Audrey Hepburn was gonna get old, you know, and what would happen then?"
It's the song's chorus that hits the hardest, looking back now: "Didn't time sound sweet yesterday? In a world filled with friends, you lose your way."
Although Farris didn't end up recording Alvin's "Blue Boulevard", the consideration of it led them to an old X tune which became a highlight of Anyway. "We were working on that ('Blue Boulevard'), and we were playing it, and then Dave goes, 'Do you know "Poor Girl"?' And I’m like, (laughs) 'Yeah. Every word!' And I sang the whole thing for him. And so we recorded that."
A few of its lyrics, perhaps, speak to where Amy traveled -- and to the notion that perhaps we should seek to remember her most for the good she brought to those around her, in the time that she had:
Life turned and wandered
Never to come back again
Take what she gives you
And don't feel sorry for her....
(Amy with Dave Alvin & the Guilty Women in Connecticut in July 2009,
joining Christy McWilson on Christy's song "Potter's Field")
Views: 40
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Comment by Ron Frankl on October 21, 2009 at 10:06am -
Beautiful, Peter. Thank you.
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Comment by Conqueroo on October 21, 2009 at 4:17pm
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Thank you Peter. Amy is missed.
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Comment by chris sweeney on October 21, 2009 at 7:03pm
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Peter, thanks for that nice post.
I'm still in disbelief about Amy, but I guess you really never know what goes on with people.
I will miss her very much.
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Comment by Marianne Taylor on October 27, 2009 at 7:22am -
Thank you, Peter. That was beautiful. I still can't believe that Amy is gone and went the way that she did.
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Comment by Richard Feimster on October 27, 2009 at 7:59am -
Don't know how I missed this info until now, but what a bummer. I saw Amy a couple of years ago in Charlotte and she came out before her set, sat down beside me and started talking. She was delightful and it made a lasting impression. RIP
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Comment by Dixie Dee Cups on October 27, 2009 at 10:31am -
I saw her (with Dave Alvin & the Guilty Women) at Bumbershoot in Seattle, and I remember thinking, wow, she (Amy) looks sooooo sad...may she rest peacefully.
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Comment by Tied to the Tracks on October 27, 2009 at 11:33am
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I've thought often of Amy since word arrived in early October that she was gone. I knew of Amy before I met her, and before she moved to L.A. where we became acquainted soon after her arrival. I had been dating one of the stars of the Austin music scene before that, and Amy was her daughter's violin teacher. So I already knew that Amy Farris was beloved by all. When she moved to L.A., it didn't take long to learn why. She was charming and oh so musically talented.
We became good enough friends that she asked me what I thought of an early performance in L.A., and she wanted a straight answer. I suggested she take vocal lessons, to bring her singing up to something that approached her stellar instrumental musicianship. When I saw her perform a few months later, she blew me away on all counts. After the show, she gave me that million dollar smile, a warm, tight hug, and whispered in my ear, "Thanks for the advice."
There was one recent almost-connection with Amy. You may know that I'm not supposed to be using the computer, following eye surgery. (I make my living using the computer.) There was a wonderful benefit concert for me, all day this past Sunday, with some of L.A.'s finest acoustic musicians. There were even a surprise few songs from Canadian multiple-award-winner John Wort Hannam. When it was my turn to speak and thank everyone, I found myself talking about Amy, and how I thought her spirit was there in the room with us, and that I hoped she was joining us there, and how I missed her. And I spoke of Eric Lowen (Lowen & Navarro) and his indomitable spirit as he battles ALS (Lou Genrig's Disease). I know I said something about how we need to take care of each other, and my gratitude that so many were there, expressing that for me.
Using the computer is quite disorienting after eye surgery, since nothing about the world is quite the same, It's easy to feel seasick. And it's not just the funhouse mirror eyesight; that's how I've felt in many other ways, since learning of Amy's passing. I wish I could talk with her. I wish I could have talked with her before she left us.
While I didn't book, or in any way organize, my own benefit show, I did offer a list of folks I hoped they would ask to perform. Amy was on that list. A few days later, the 7-hour concert (including plans for what became a sumptuous dinner) was completely booked with wonderful and superb artists who had stepped forward and asked to play. And less than two weeks later, long before the concert, Amy was gone.
I last saw her perform with Dave Alvin and the Guilty Women at the Live Oak Music Festival, north of Santa Barbara, in mid June of this year. After the show, Amy and I sat on hay bales, side by side, in close and comfortable contact. We talked and laughed for something approaching 45 minutes. We had a glass or a bottle of something that we passed back and forth. I guess it was juice, though it seemed like wine. We talked about her doing my Tied to the Tracks radio show when it goes to syndication, and doing an hour-long performance-interview. We had talked about that before, of course. She was, as always, enthusiastic about it.
I know that everyone is trying to decipher events and conversations and interviews, looking for any telltale signs of darkness. On that evening in June, I thought what I was reading, past her words, was that she was tired, close to worn out from the piled-high agenda of the sought-after musician who juggles and tries to keep all the balls in the air. I assumed it was just a lot of touring with the Guilty Women and doing a lot of session work, and trying to keep all the bills paid, as always. I recall answers to some of my questions that seemed focused on a few specifics, rather that the big wide world of "how ya doin'," and it would not have seemed appropriate to press beyond her answers. We were having a friendly "let's-catch-up" conversation and sharing laughs, not doing an interview.
And, like everyone else, who knew we would never see her again?
I'm not writing this with dry eyes. Others who loved her may find it too raw and painful to communicate their sense of loss in so public a forum. I'm sure the most used phrases in all the comments will be "I miss her," or "I miss you, Amy." And so I add mine, with heartfelt sorrow. And the hope we will not be sharing these cyber pages with sorrow for yet another bright shining star whose light is extinguished far too soon. With that as my closing thought, take care of each other, folks.
- Larry
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Larry Wines, programmer-producer-host, “Tied to the Tracks” acoustic Americana radio, syndicated from Los Angeles, with live in-studio performance-interviews, included in “The Best of L.A. 2006” radio lineup by Los Angeles Magazine; editor, “Acoustic Americana Music Guide & News” at http://acousticamericana.blogspot.com and
www.nodepression.com/profile/TiedtotheTracks and additional “TttT” news is on the No Depression page and at www.myspace.com/laacoustic; Larry is a consultant to artists, musicians, songwriters, festivals, and the music biz, and a feature writer and columnist for FolkWorks (www.folkworks.org).
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Check-out Larry’s latest column for FolkWorks, published Sep 1, available online at www.folkworks.org/content/viewcategorycur/89 - and latest FolkWorks review, at www.folkworks.org/content/view/36151/167. And, you can still read the extensive “BEST OF 2008 / TOP TEN” feature for FolkWorks, available online at www.folkworks.org/content/view/35788/166
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PS - No trees were killed in the sending of this message, but a substantial number of electrons were terribly inconvenienced.
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Comment by Tied to the Tracks on October 27, 2009 at 9:35pm
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I SEE HAWKS IN L.A. are paying tribute to the late AMY FARRIS this week on their blog with some MP3s of the Hawks and Amy from Cole's basement. The guys add, “We miss you sister.” As do we. Find their tribute at www.iseehawks.com/hawkslog/#000394
[from the Acoustic Americana Music Guide...]
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Comment by Loren Minnick on November 17, 2009 at 9:33pm
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Good post. However, I don't think that Amy left any clues in her work or interviews. Like many lifelong depressives, she was adept at playing a role and she put great energy into her persona. She had a wicked sense of black humor and was incredibly detail oriented and focused when her illness allowed it. I worked with her for several years before I had any inkling that anything was wrong. About five years ago she let me and my family into her "other" life and we worked with others to help her as best we could. Through Amy I learned to respect the devastating power of full-on depression and I also learned to respect Amy's courage and battling spirit.
Comment
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