It’s all relative Folks of all kinds near and dear for Wainwright as he marks life and career milestones By: Alan Small Posted: 4:41 PM CDT Thursday, Jul. 6, 2023

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This article was published 06/07/2023 (1111 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

The Winnipeg Folk Festival has grown into a community of the folks, by the folks and for the folks who call Birds Hill Provincial Park home away from home for one weekend every July.

This loosely formed version of self-governance is a theme for Rufus Wainwright’s new album, Folkocracy, songs from which he will perform at his folk fest mainstage show Friday night.

Growing up, Wainwright noticed the phenomenon when he would attend and later perform at festivals with his musical family: his mother, the late Kate McGarrigle; his father, Loudon Wainwright III; his sister, Martha Wainwright; and his half-sister, Lucy Wainwright Roche.

“That’s where I first came into contact with folkocracies, where we would do shows with the Seegers or the Thompsons,” Wainwright says of two other famous folk-music families that included folk-music heroes Pete Seeger and Richard Thompson. “Winnipeg and Cambridge, in England, were the two festivals where I got the sense that I was part of this collective of different families who sing together and generationally.

“Even though we’re not staying at the fanciest hotels and we have to take vans everywhere and nobody is (shopping at) Bergdorf Goodman, it’s still an artistically satisfying thing and worth all the work.”

While Wainwright has memories of performing with his family at past Winnipeg folk fests — “I remember the flies, but I also remember the amazing Rosalie Goldstein,” he says of the festival’s artistic director from 1987 to 1991 — this is the first time he’s on the bill as a solo performer.

“I’ve been very happy I’ve been able to carve out my own kind of world and I don’t have to rely entirely on my family, but it is an ace in the hole,” he says.

He will play that trump card this weekend. Wainwright Roche is part of his touring band his summer, and while it hasn’t been officially scheduled by the folk festival, he expects to be part of a workshop with his father Loudon, who is performing Saturday afternoon at the Snowberry Field stage.

“I don’t know where and when. We will be crossing paths for sure, keeping it a family affair,” he says.

Wainwright also has a number of musical friends and acquaintances, and they play a large role in Folkocracy. Collaborations abound among its 15 songs, including duets with John Legend, Brandi Carlile, David Byrne, Chaka Khan and, naturally, with his sisters Martha and Lucy.

Wainwright lives in Los Angeles, specifically the legendary musical hangout of Laurel Canyon, and while the neighbourhood is best known as where the rock stars of the ’60s and ’70s turned on, tuned in and dropped out, the beat still goes on in the 2020s.

“One of the subtitles of this record could be ‘the perks of living in Hollywood,’” Wainwright says with a chuckle. “A lot of it was just getting on the phone and seeing who was in town and wasn’t too far away from the studio… We reached out in a very relaxed way, so there was no grand plan, necessarily.

“Besides the smog and the gun violence and the forest fires, L.A. has some good things about it as well.”

He counts two scions of that era, Chris Stills, the son of fabled folk-rock Stephen Stills and actor Bijou Phillips (daughter of John Phillips of the Mamas and the Papas) as friends, and Stills also appears on Folkocracy.

“I still feel like a tourist when I’m there, admiring the vibe and being inspired by it rather than being chained to it,” says Wainwright, who was born in New York’s Hudson River valley and grew up in Montreal. “I know what (living in Laurel Canyon) means and I’m thankful that my mother chose to take us up to Canada when we were very young to kind of keep us away from a lot of those shenanigans.”

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Wainwright also has room for his solo takes on folk standards, including a lovely rendition of Shenandoah, which is derived from a tune sung by Canadian and American voyageurs in the early 180os and has been recorded by many people over the years.

“That’s an amazing song that I’ve always admired,” Wainwright says. “The other day I had an amazing experience of actually being in Virginia singing it — the Shenandoah River is in Virginia — the sun was setting, it was at a wonderful gay and lesbian festival put on by Brandi Carlile. It was quite epic. That song is a real gem.”

Wainwright turns 50 later this month, and 2023 also marks the 25th anniversary of his debut album. Since then he’s also recorded tributes to Judy Garland, and composed operas and Broadway musicals. He describes himself as a musical octopus.

He looks back at the 25-year-old Rufus Wainwright, the arc of his career and likes what he sees.

“I have thought about it occasionally and I’d like to say to that person, ‘Just keep doing exactly what you’re doing, you’re on the right track, you’ve made the right decision.

‘But maybe lay off the chocolates a little bit.’”

Alan.Small@winnipegfreepress.com

Twitter: @AlanDSmall

Alan Small
Reporter

Alan Small was a journalist at the Free Press for more than 22 years in a variety of roles, the last being a reporter in the Arts and Life section.

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