Folk singer Karin Blaine: one voice and one guitar

By Tina Potterf
Seattle Times staff reporter

	BRADLEY WHITE Seattle's Karin Blaine is hoping to make singing a full-time performing career.
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While Blaine was a student of classical music — studying both piano and violin — she was drawn to the raw emotion and simple beauty in folk and blues. What she discovered with folk, particularly, was that a voice, accompanied often by little more than an acoustic guitar, could stir passion or so perfectly express heartache. This awakening was inspiring for Blaine, who by age 12 was learning to play Peter, Paul and Mary songs on a guitar and was testing her abilities as a folk singer at junior high-school talent shows.

The Seattle singer-songwriter knew she had found her calling.

"My father gave me a book, the 'Faces of Folk Music,' which I still have on my coffee table," said Blaine, 51. "I looked at those folks and said, 'My God, this is what I want to be.' "

After a hiatus from music in the mid- to late-1990s, Blaine reconnected with her music roots and returned to Seattle from Boston to begin work on songs that would eventually end up on her debut full-length recording, "Dirty Money."

Karin Blaine Featuring: Seattle singer-songwriter Karin Blaine. Discography: "Dirty Money." Web site: www.karinblaine.com Next shows: 9 p.m. Dec. 13, St. Clouds Food and Spirits, 1131 34th Ave., Seattle; 8 p.m. Dec. 20, Stuart's Coffeehouse, 1302 Bay St., Bellingham. Sample lyrics: Maybe I need some kind of power Maybe I need some kind of release Maybe I need a way out of my troubles Maybe I need some kind of grace With this dirty money in my wallet With these fingerprints on my thighs With the games I've played over and over What kind of grace can I find? — from "Dirty Money"

Blaine recently talked about her evolution as an artist and the differences between the East Coast and West Coast folk-music scenes.

Q: What are your earliest memories of music?

A: I was very fortunate in that I grew up in a very musical family. There were two camps in my family: My dad was very musical. He loved blues and traditional folk music and boogey-woogey piano. He had a lot of recordings of that kind of music. My mother had an extensive classical-music background. I come from a family of five girls, and we all studied classical music.

Q: You were drawn to blues and folk music from an early age. Why?

A: I think it's a couple of things: Just given my personality, I think I really needed a vehicle for self-expression, which means I really needed to be able to sing. What I really, really dug about that music is that I have a very simple format to my performing: one voice and one guitar. I would listen to these artists, like Bob Dylan and Pete Seeger; it's one voice and one instrument. That's all you need to be heard. I couldn't believe the emotion that they could put across with that one format.

Q: Describe the music of Karin Blaine.

A: I'm a chanteuse with a guitar. I'm really about communicating through song to my audience. Really the song can be my own tune or someone else's. It's really about my ability to interpret that song and make it happen in a new way.

Q: What did you want to get across with your first CD, "Dirty Money"?

A: "Dirty Money" was somewhat impulsive. I really felt that I wanted to be out playing actively again. I hadn't really been actively playing out for a while, so I really felt that I needed a CD. The song lineup ended up just being varied, with five original tunes and seven covers. Basically I wanted to have my music out there in a form that I could be proud of. It's just me and my guitar. I just played it really straight.

Q: What is the most interesting thing someone has said about your music?

A: People talk a lot about the emotion I put into my songs. I think mostly it's the emotional power of the music.

Q: Seattle is home to many singer-songwriters. Is it challenging to stand out or set yourself apart from the crowd?

A: When I was younger, I think I worried about that a lot more. I think I was more worried about what other people were doing. I have a lot of confidence in my songwriting now — that's born out from the success I have had in my limited way. The one quality that I have is that I think of myself as more of an entertainer. I adore being on the stage. I love communicating with my audience. In the early days I was an earnest songwriter. I was self-absorbed with the sincerity of my music. Be it a combination of age or whatever, now I want to make beautiful music and entertain people. I want them to have an experience when they are sitting there.

Q: I know you took a break from music for a period. What prompted you to return?

A: I had moved back to Boston in the early 1990s, just showed up there, lived with my younger sister, had my two guitars. It was pretty freaky for me. I think I was thinking I needed to have a more conventional life. I just put (music) down. I stopped playing. The strange thing was that a few years later, I took out my guitar and I decided that I was going to start playing.

Q: Did you find your music had changed?

A: I started singing more differently. I wasn't afraid to open my lungs. Probably I had to put the guitar down to make it happen. I ended up being better. The way I ended up singing and presenting myself connects way better with audiences. I guess that little hiatus paid off.

Q: Having lived on the East Coast, how does the music scene in Boston compare with Seattle and the West Coast?

A: When I came back to Seattle I felt so out of it. The songwriting scene is really different back there. We're wilder out here. I think we're more innovative and more experimental. It's more of that storytelling songwriting in Boston/New England. And there's 10 times as many players playing (there). I had to play open mic again. I had to stand in line knee-deep in other players. There was just a lot more competition. I think I pictured it as more of a lateral move for me, but it wasn't; I moved backward.

Q: Looking ahead five years, where would you like to be with your music?

A: I would really love to take a run at a full-time performing career and I would love to perform in Europe. That's one of my goals — to tour in Europe as well as the U.S. I really want to have the day happen when I can say, "God, I'm so sick of touring." I just want to tour so much that I can't stand it.

Tina Potterf: 206-464-8214 or tpotterf@seattletimes.com

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