He’s a songwriter, humanitarian, legendary musician and recently scored a big Broadway hit.

Travelgirl: I’m so happy to be with you and to get to know you. Everyone knows Huey Lewis the musician. You are also a humanitarian and very philanthropic. You have been quite involved with San Rafael’s Lifehouse, whose mission is to improve the lives of those living with disabilities and help them live independent lives. You’ve been an honorary chair and emcee for their fundraisers. Please let us know how you became involved in this most worthwhile endeavor.

Huey Lewis: I sang an anthem for a Special Olympics about 45 years ago and I was so touched by the group. It was such a nice thing, and my neighbor was also involved. The association was formerly called the Marin Association of Retarded Citizens. It is now called Lifehouse and its purpose is to help disabled folks live independent lives.

I’ve been chairman of the association’s big fundraiser for 35 years now and it really is a wonderfully gratifying thing. If you are a developmentally disabled person in Marin or Sonoma counties in California, you are a lot better off than almost any other place in the world. We have independent living situations. I’ve gotten to know some of the clients well over the years and it’s just a fun thing. It’s not a lot of heavy lifting.

We have a wonderful chef’s banquet called The Great Chefs & Wineries where we invite all the great restaurants and all the great wineries in Marin and Sonoma counties to come and make a one dish, one wine table. It’s a black-tie event featuring an enormous, incredible buffet. We raise tons of money, and it all goes to a great cause. I am chairman so I say a few words; it’s very gratifying. There’s a lot to be learned from these very special people. They joyfully notice the little things that we don’t pay any attention to, and they radiate happiness. It’s a wonderful, important cause.

TG: Let’s start with your hearing loss. In 1987 you suddenly lost hearing in one of your ears. How did you cope and how difficult was it to keep performing?

HL: Let’s go with that; how exciting. Hit me with the hits — hearing loss; let’s do it. I exist on these hearing aids, which Bluetooth connects to my phone and my television. I am really very, very deaf and it’s probably getting worse. I’m possibly headed for a cochlear implant, which is not a fun thing. But if you really can’t hear, it becomes a fun, necessary thing.

TG: You were able to overcome losing the hearing in your right ear but you were still able to perform and hear with just one ear.

HL: I was diagnosed with Meniere’s Disease 35 years ago. At first, I had a bout of intense vertigo; it was so bad they had to take me to the hospital but no one could figure out what it was. The doctors gave me some medicine of some sort and three hours later I was fine. About 30 years ago I lost the hearing in my right ear. I was able to exist on one ear for a long time. Then six years ago my left ear went and now I can’t hear music at all and I can’t perform. I can’t hear pitch. With the aid of hearing aids I can hear you and I can hear a conversation with three or four people at a time, maybe, if I am in a quiet room. In a noisy room I can only hear one person and I need to be looking at that person to understand the conversation.

TG: If music is playing, you can’t hear it? Is that correct?

HL: Zero. I cannot hear music. You can play one of my songs and I can’t identify the song; that’s how bad I am. Speech exists in a much narrower frequency than music. Music, even one note, occurs in all frequencies with harmonics and overtones and undertones. Just listening to you is a struggle for me; it’s changed me. My show on Broadway, The Heart of Rock and Roll, has been my salvation in a lot of ways. It’s given me a creative outlet and kept me busy.

Zen Buddhists say you need three things in life: something to love, something to hope for and something to do. The something to hope for and the something to do are my show on Broadway. I have other things going on as well. I’m lucky; I remind myself that plenty of people are way worse off than I am. I’m not dead; I’m just deaf. I’m actually a glass half full kind of guy. I’m a major key, not a minor key guy.

TG: I can’t wait to see your musical, The Heart of Rock and Roll. Everyone I know is excited about it. What’s the genesis of the show? I know our Travelgirl readers will want to head to New York to see it. I absolutely love Broadway and I’m thrilled you are bringing your music to the Great White Way!

HL: I love Broadway too. It’s the most challenging and therefore the most rewarding of artistic expression. It’s totally collaborative and it’s complicated. [We made a documentary about our song We Are the World (in 1985, 46 legendary musicians came together for one night to raise money for African aid)]. The iconic Quincy Jones, who co-produced the song, addressed us before we performed the background vocals. This isn’t in the documentary, but Quincy said, “Look people, here’s what we are doing, we are building a house. We are going to start with the foundation, order the tracks, put in the walls, the studs and put a roof on it. That’s what we are doing now, putting up studs and we will finish the work later on.” His description was really clever. The metaphor for making a record is building a house. Well, if that’s true, then putting on a Broadway show is building a city with parks and pathways and all kinds of paraphernalia. I love it and it’s been a really fun trip.

TG: Does your hearing loss make creating a Broadway musical more difficult?

HL: It makes it impossible to hear the music, but I lost hearing in my left ear six years ago on January 17. Before that I could hear music. As it so happens, you only need one ear to hear. When I lost hearing in my first ear, I went to my EENT doctor. My father was a doctor and he sent me to the best EENT doctor in all of Northern California. I went to see this specialist and he told me to adapt to the hearing loss. I reiterated to him that I was a musician and a singer. The doctor told me I only needed one ear to hear. He told me Brian Wilson [The Beach Boys] only had hearing in one ear and Jimi Hendrix only had hearing in one ear.

The doctor also told me that he only had hearing in one ear and that he performed in a barbershop quartet. I existed on one ear for a long time, and I had that ear and hearing seven years ago when we imagined this show. I had reimagined most of the songs by that time. Our musical director, Brian Usifer, is brilliant. He has done his homework so thoroughly. He knows our music so well that he has reimagined the songs and given them their own setting. There is very little to quibble with, even when I could hear. As a footnote, they had to make me a producer because of the songs and now they have to listen to everything I have to say.

TG: It’s your music they are performing.

HL: It’s my music and my show now!

TG: You were born in New York City but grew up in California. Did you have an interest in music when you were young? Your father was a doctor but he was also a musician; I believe he played the drums. Did he encourage your interest in music?

HL: My old man absolutely had an influence on me. There was a set of drums in my living room my whole life. Since my early years, I spent my life surrounded by musical equipment. My father didn’t like singers; he liked big band jazz. He would play these big band jazz records, instrumental stuff and every once and a while there would be a singer. Naturally I wanted to rebel a little bit so I kind of dug the singers. My first influences were Mr. Five by Five, Count Basie and all the old blues singers and musicians.

TG: You have two plays featuring your music on Broadway. Your own, The Heart of Rock and Roll, and Back to the Future. It’s astounding; two plays running concurrently.

HL: It’s amazing and I’m not sure it’s ever happened before. I don’t know if it’s true or not. Someone told me that but even if it is true, it doesn’t mean that I’m Richard Rodgers.

TG: Let’s talk about the genesis of Back to the Future. It’s a beloved film and your name is synonymous with that movie. You contributed to the soundtrack and had a small role in the movie. Please talk about your experiences with that film and your iconic songs that are central to the show. Did you have any idea it would become a landmark film?

HL: I had no idea it would be such a paramount hit. I was asked to take a meeting with [Steven] Spielberg, who was the executive producer, Robert Zemeckis and Bob Gale, whose story it is. Neil Canton was also a writer on the show. The meeting was organized through Amblin Entertainment, which had just started. We sat there and Zemeckis told me they had written this movie about a kid named Marty McFly, and his favorite band would be Huey Lewis and the News. So, they asked me to write some songs. I was flattered. I told Zemeckis I didn’t necessarily know how to write for film and honestly I didn’t fancy writing a song called Back to the Future

Zemeckis said, “Oh, no, no, no, we don’t care what the song is called. We just want one of your songs in the film.” He told me that whatever I decided, that’s the one it will be. Well, I thought the next thing we do is write and we wrote The Power of Love. It’s a little more complicated than that. I didn’t think it was going to work because Power of Love is a love song, right? There is no love object in the film. But they used it wonderfully and it was a great lesson.

We’ve tried to employ the same thing in our Broadway show, which is the idea that songs help a musical or a show when they are tangentially tied to the project; not when the songs are a literal translation of what’s going on. If the song was just called Back to the Future, it wouldn’t have been so universal, if you will. I tried to do that with The Heart of Rock and Roll. It’s important that the songs move the story forward. The songs in my show are laid out beautifully by Tyler Mitchell and Jonathan A. Abrams. Their initial layout is brilliant because they know the music so well. I didn’t initially realize how well the songs fit the story. But they do and it’s pretty cool.

TG: I saw Back to the Future on Broadway. When they sing The Power of Love everyone goes crazy and they are referencing you.

HL: First of all, Uncle Huey is a character in the show. That’s their little nod to my cameo in the film. When they play Power of Love it has nothing to do with the story at all. It’ s Marty McFly and the Pinheads and it’s my logo. It’s the triangle with Huey Lewis and the News. It’s exactly my nine-piece band with the three-piece horn section. When I first saw it in London, I was sitting next to Bob Gale. I looked at Bob and told him I thought they owed me a set design credit. He told me they only pinch from the best.

TG: Your song, The Power of Love, is synonymous with the movie, Back to the Future.

HL: Thank goodness. The film just keeps growing. We did a 35-year reunion and every five years we go on television and reassemble the cast. Huey Lewis and the News was on top of the world back then and our song, The Power of Love, was huge. It was the perfect time for us. We had just toured with our Sports album and now we had to come up with another album. You wanted to keep the momentum in those days. The Power of Love was the perfect way to continue the momentum. We recorded it and we gave it to the movie and it went straight to number one.

The Power of Love went to number one in nine weeks, which is remarkably fast. From the close of principal photography for Back to the Future to the release of the movie, it was the fastest ever completed in Hollywood history. The producers knew the song was on its way to number one and they wanted to get the movie out to gain the momentum from the song. The day the movie was released, our song, The Power of Love, was the number one song in the country.

Interestingly, we weren’t allowed to put that song on one of our albums because MCA had purchased it and owned the rights. They wouldn’t let us put it on one of our albums in America but they did in the rest of the world. Not in America but in the rest of the world we added The Power of Love to our album Fore. In the rest of the world our album Fore is way bigger than our album, Sports.

It’s interesting. In America we have numerous big hits, This is It, Heart and Soul, I Want a New Drug, Heart of Rock and Roll, Bad is Bad. In Europe they hardly know any of these songs. They know Jacob’s Ladder, Stuck With You, Power of Love, Doing It All For My Baby because those were on the other record. It’s amazing. A lot of this is business, right? One of the reasons Power of Love is such a wonderful, amazing song is because it’s in the movie and the movie was the biggest movie of all time. We have a lot of great songs, but this one was in the movie.

TG: All of these incredible songs are yours; they are part of your history. Is there one song among all these memorable hits that is your favorite?

HL: No, I can’t name a favorite. I honestly think these songs on our latest record, Her Love is Killing Me and While We’re Young, and Remind Me Why I Love You Again, are three of the best things we’ve ever done. In my opinion, I think our last record is really our best work.

TG: Please talk about making the album Weather.

HL: We released Weather. It only has seven songs because of the loss of my hearing. It’s a record that we did piece by piece. It’s what we do; we write songs and we record them. So what we were doing over the course of almost 15 years was to play shows everywhere. We would write a song and record it in our home studio. We had a very nice studio; we used to have a complex with a recording studio, offices, etc. We would record the song and learn to love it. We would take it on the road and work on it and then bring it back, record it and put it in the can. We would play it for months, then cut it and we kept doing it until we had about seven songs. It’s hard to be prolific when you’ve written over 80 songs. Because we wrote for such a long time, these are our best works, the most realized.

“I fell in love with Broadway because of all the people — all the talent. Not only are the Broadway actors talented; they are smart, funny and self-effacing.”

TG: Now I have a question from my daughter’s son, Harry. He wants to know why you changed your name from Huey Lewis and the American Express to Huey Lewis and the News?

HL: That’s a great question! The record label made us change our name. Tell Harry that’s a super good question! The reason we were Huey Lewis and the American Express, which I think is a great name, is because it’s what I thought we sounded like. I thought it was the best name ever. No one had ever done a corporate tie in, zero; it had never been done. The first person to do it was Michael Jackson with Pepsi. Prior to that, it was the kiss of death; it just wasn’t done. They were afraid that American Express would sue us. They only figured that out 24 hours before the cover had to be finished so we really only had 24 hours to come up with a name.

TG: Where did the News come from?

HL: It was me. I just thought of it. There were a bunch of other contenders, but we went with Huey Lewis and the News.

TG: You have so many top hits that are so memorable. Your songs include I Want a New Drug and Hip to be Square. How did you go from a song about drugs to one about being square?

HL: Hip to be Square was supposed to be funny. It may be my only regret writing wise. I originally wrote in the third person. In the lyrics, he used to be a renegade; he used to fool around. It was meant to define a phenomenon that David Brooks articulates in his book Bobos in Paradise on how people were dropping in after being too far out; how they were cutting their hair. It was almost like a fashion thing. I thought it was kind of funny; it’s hip to be square. I thought it would be funnier if I told it on myself but not everyone got the joke. Some might think it was an anthem for square people but it wasn’t meant to be. I think I’ve lived it down by now.

TG: Please talk about your career in acting.

HL: Lovely. I worked with Bob Altman, which was amazing. We went on location and he invited me to ride with him. The location was three hours away and I got a three-hour tutorial on film acting from him that was fascinating. Robert Altman was a great experience. I did a bunch of Just Shoot Me’s with Wendie Malick, Betty White, Valerie Bertinelli and Jane Leeves. The shows were written by Fraser writers and it was fantastic. I performed in one episode a year. For two weeks I shared a dressing room with Bob Newhart, who is fantastic and a TV legend. I have no desire to be more famous nor to appear as myself. If there’s not some acting required, I’m not interested.

TG: You played Billy Flynn in the musical Chicago on Broadway.

HL: I love the Broadway community and I loved doing Billy Flynn. What a great play, great musical and great character. I did 222 performances and I learned something every single day. The material is that rich and dense; it was just fabulous. I fell in love with Broadway because of all the people — all the talent. Not only are the Broadway actors talented; they are smart, funny and self-effacing. They are just fun. It’s great work. It’s the most demanding and therefore the most rewarding of artistic expression.

TG: Talk about the early days.

HL: Back in 1980, in the early days we had to have a hit record. There was no internet, no jam band, the only avenue to success was a hit record in a format called CHR, Contemporary Hit Radio. Top 40 started with the advent of push button radio. In the 50’s when they had push button radio, when the programmers opined it, as long as you didn’t hear something you didn’t like, you would just stick right there. So, narrow your play list and just play the top hits over and over again. That was top 40!

By late 70’s, early 80’s we had AM format, mono Top 40. FM Radio comes along with stereo but it’s still not broadcasting with a lot of watts. But it is stereo and it’s a free format.

Radio was the only format we all competed on. So if you had a hit there it was a big, big hit. It was unique for its time and we had to have a hit record. We insisted on producing the records ourselves because I knew we were going to have to make commercial decisions that I was going to have to live with. We aimed every song right at radio. Sports sounds like a record of its time; it’s a collection of singles and different styles.

“I’m not dead; I’m just deaf. I’m actually a glass half full kind of guy. I’m a major key, not a minor key guy.”

Conventional wisdom says you can’t do that, you have to stick with one genre, but we were all over the map. Bad is Bad is like a little bluesy thing. Honky Tonk Blues is a country song. Thin Line is a big hard rocker and One New Drug is kind of a dance tune. We consciously aimed each one of these songs as a single at radio. I knew we needed a hit and I didn’t know which one was going to hit. Our records hit so hard we were touring coliseums and achieving our dreams and doing really well financially. After that happened, I made a decision with myself and the rest of the band that this was the last thing I would ever do for commerciality. If it didn’t make artistic sense, we were not going to do it. I’ve done exactly that ever since.

TG: You are pretty amazing with a harmonica.

HL: My mom was a hippy. When she divorced my dad she moved to another house and rented out a room to a boarder. The boarder was a folk singer named Billy Roberts; he wrote Hey Joe. He had lots of harmonicas and when they would go out of tune, he would give them to me. I was in high school so I started playing harmonica. I graduated high school a year early at 16 years old; my dad told me there was one thing I had to do. He told me to take a year off and bum around Europe. I told him I had been accepted to Cornell and he said no, take a year off and head to Europe. He actually made me do that. I took the harmonica with me; it fit the image.

My mother told me that was the first good decision my old man had ever made. She gave me a Bob Dylan record and told me the poets love this guy and told me to check it out. I listened to the Dylan record, brought my harmonica and in my mind, I was a wandering minstrel throughout the world. I hitchhiked Europe, hitch-hiked North Africa; I went to Marrakech for a day and stayed three months.

TG: Travelgirl wants to know, do you have a favorite travel destination?

HL: I have several places I want to visit. I’m a fanatic flyfisherman and I want to go the Seychelles and fish. That’s a bucket list thing.

TG: Huey, you’ve paved quite a path. Do you have any sage advice for those young hopefuls who aspire to one day follow in your legendary footsteps?

HL: I’ve always told people that unless a career in music is the only thing — the only thing — you want to do, I suggest you go back to school and study. If it is the only thing you want to do, then listen to everyone and pick and choose the advice that you want to take. Think through it all, keep dancing and in the final analysis, trust your instincts. Just keep at it; keep trying and working.

The post TG Coverguy: Huey Lewis appeared first on Travelgirl.

From small-town Tennessee to Las Vegas and Netflix, Leanne Morgan talks about her life and gets 50 million YouTube views

Travelgirl: It’s a pleasure to welcome you to Travelgirl Magazine. I was recently in Las Vegas and saw the large billboard outside the Wynn announcing your show. How did a girl from Tennessee make her way to the Wynn Hotel in Las Vegas? First, please tell me about growing up in Tennessee.

Leanne Morgan: I was raised in a town of 500 people, a farming community in middle Tennessee on the Kentucky- Tennessee border called Adams, TN. My people are farmers on both sides, going generations back. I was raised there until I went to college at the University of Tennessee. I always wanted to be in show business from the time I was a little girl. I didn’t know how or when, but I ended up being in standup.

TG: You graduated with a degree from the University of Tennessee and married your sweetheart Chuck. You two moved to Bean Station, Tennessee and started your family. Will you elaborate on these years?

LM: Chuck and I met at the University of Tennessee and he bought a refurbishing manufactured housing business in his 20s, and moved us to Bean Station, TN, and I got pregnant with our first baby Charlie. I worked for Chuck for a little while. I’m country and rural, but this was a different kind of rural. I got my degree in Child and Family Studies Crisis Intervention Counseling. I thought I would be a therapist if I wasn’t going to make it in Hollywood. I mostly wanted to be a momma more than anything.

TG: You seem to be quite the entrepreneur. You started selling jewelry at home parties. I read you were hilarious at these parties. Please talk about this.

LM: I didn’t want to go to work full time and leave Charlie, but I wanted a side hustle to make a little money in the foothills of the Appalachian Mountains–you know to get my hair done and buy Charlie outfits. My friend was selling jewelry and asked me if I wanted to sell jewelry too. I would go into women’s houses and put jewelry on kitchen tables and eat dip and brownies. I developed an act and women thought I was funny. These women actually even started booking me about a year in advance.

TG: You said you had a moment, when you were selling jewelry, that you realized you could make it in comedy. It’s funny. Can you elaborate?

LM: I was at somebody’s house. There was a woman sitting on the couch, her name was Carmen, and she got so tickled about something that I said that she pee-peed on the couch. That was a God moment for me. I knew I was funny. I wanted to do standup, but I didn’t know how it would be possible when I was in the foothills of the Appalachian Mountains. When she laughed, I knew I could do it. I could make it in comedy. I am still good friends with Carmen after all these years. I tell her all the time that she was part of that decision that I made. I knew I could go for it. The jewelry company noticed that I was booking so far in advance, that they asked me to speak at their large events.

TG: Were there any early mentors in your life who encouraged you to pursue your dream of becoming a stand-up comedian?

LM: There was a man named Dennis Swanberg who was a Christian comedian performing at one of those large jewelry events that I spoke at and he told me off stage that I could do it. That was pivotal. It meant a lot to me and I thought ‘Okay, I can do this.’ Also Brian Dorfman. He let me open at Zanies Comedy Club 20-some years ago, and after my set he said “I think you’ve got something, but it’s going to be hard to do this with three babies, traveling and leaving them. But I think you got it. You’re just going to have to find another way.” I knew I had to figure it out and take a different path.

TG: You were becoming successful and raising a family. How did you balance both your rising career and your family? You’ve been successful at both.

LM: I had to just take what I could, being a momma, I would do a lot of private and local corporate events. Chuck would travel during the week. I would go on the weekends, and just work around his schedule and the kids’ schedules. I came third but that was okay. I never felt that I didn’t get to do my own thing because I always wanted my family to be my first priority. I would do comedy clubs every once in a while, but I had to do what I could to accommodate my family. I always wanted to put them first.

TG: Talk about a girl who lived in Bean Station, Tennessee making it to the Just For Laughs Festival in Montreal. Were you intimidated or does that Leanne moxie get you out there?

LM: It is intimidating because I did not come up in the New York or LA comedy scene. I always felt like an outsider. When I did get invited to something like that, I was intimidated. But now I feel pretty good about it. I’m 58 years old and now after all these tours and doing a movie, I finally feel like I have a place there.

TG: You are not only a stand-up success, but you have also over three million followers across social media and your online special, So-Yummy, has reached over 50 million views on YouTube. Please talk about So-Yummy.

LM: Honest to goodness nothing else was going on in my career and I was thinking about quitting. Then out of the blue, Dry Bar Comedy asked me to do a special. I honestly thought nobody would see it. I did a bunch of old material.

TG: I watched your Netflix special Leanne Morgan: I’m Every Woman. So many moments in that show are relatable to all of us. I laughed and laughed. Please talk about writing and performing the show.

LM: Well, I was doing this material before COVID, and then COVID stopped everything, and there was a lot of time off. There were a lot of things I probably lost and couldn’t remember, so I started building it back up and performing again after COVID. Every time I do any new hour, I’m always weaving in my family, and it takes me a while to get it, but it’s always something to do with what’s happening in my life. I’ve got grandbabies; I’ve gone through menopause. Throughout my 20 years of comedy, there is always something going on in my real life. The Netflix special was what was going on in my life at that time. And I am a storyteller, so I’m long winded. It is not small bits. It is always long stories of my life and my family.

TG: You are living proof that through hard work you can attain your dreams. Do you have any sage advice for those young hopefuls out there who hope to be the next Leanne Morgan?

LM: If this is something you know in your heart that you need to be doing, then keep going. Listen to your gut. If this is something you’re meant to be doing, then follow what you’re passionate about. Hard work pays off; it’s not a short-term thing. Keep going, keep working, keep doing what you love and never give up.

TG: You travel constantly. Do you have one special item you never leave home without?

LM: My iPad!!! I love my iPad so that I can watch my shows and look at pictures of my grandbabies.

TG: Travelgirl readers will want to know, do you have a special place you love to travel to and what’s on Leanne’s travel bucket list?

LM: I really enjoy everywhere, but I love going to the Carolina and Georgia coasts, like Charleston and Savannah. All around there has been a favorite. I would really like to go over to the UK, and do a tour in the UK.

TG: Talk about what’s next on your busy career. This summer you have a tour called Just Getting Started and you will be seen on the screen in the Amazon Prime feature, You’re Cordially Invited, starring alongside Will Ferrell and Reese Witherspoon.

LM: I’m hoping to do television, more touring, and more movies! I also have a book coming out in September 2024 called What in the World?.

TG: What’s the one most important thing you want Travelgirl readers to know about Leanne Morgan?

LM: I want them to know that I feel this is more than comedy. Since this has happened to me, my fans have been more like friends and a community, and they have lifted me up and want to see me win. It is bigger than comedy and more special and sweeter than anything I could have ever imagined. I want people to know how much I appreciate my career and the love my fans give me.

TG: Is there one charity you want to mention, so you could help

LM: My family is incredibly involved with East Tennessee Children’s Hospital and childhood illnesses. My husband is a volunteer and a baby cuddler. My daughter Maggie works in development and raises money for the hospital, and my grandson was in the NICU and East Tennessee Children’s Hospital took wonderful care of him.

TG: I have truly loved researching and reading about you. You are an absolute treasure and I am more than delighted to get to know you and to welcome you to Travelgirl Magazine.

The post TG Covergirl: Leanne Morgan appeared first on Travelgirl.

Iconic country singer is a sensation on the music charts, on television and in Las Vegas.

It’s a great honor to welcome back country music superstar Luke Bryan to Travelgirl. This legendary giant of country music graced our cover a few years back. We are honored to tell more of his motivational and inspirational story. The uber talented Luke Bryan has garnered more than 22 billion worldwide streams and has released more than 30 number one hits. This ambassador of good will and singer/songwriter superstar amassed 56 total weeks at number one in his career. He was recently presented with the SoundExchange Hall of Fame Award in recognition of his standing as one of the most streamed artists in SoundExchange’s 20-year history.

The five-time Entertainer of the Year has played for more than 14 million fans. His headline concert tours have played sold-out performances for millions of fans in more than 40 stadium concerts, Farm Tours, Spring Break shows, and sold-out ‘Crash My Playa’ destination concert events.

He was born in Leesburg, Georgia, on July 17, 1976, and his keen interest in music began when he was young, listening to his parents’ records, which included music from country stars Merle Haggard and George Strait. When Luke turned 14, his parents purchased a guitar for him and Luke began singing with local bands. He honed his craft in high school, performing in musicals and writing his own songs. He was on his way to stardom.

Travelgirl: You were born in Leesburg, Georgia, and your dad was a farmer. What was it like growing up with your family in Georgia?

Luke Bryan: Growing up in Georgia, my dad was a farmer and we worked in agriculture, so we were always looking up at the sky, checking if rain was in the forecast. That always set the tone for the mood in my household, whether we had rain coming in or not — we knew the crops would be good and it was going to be a good week around the Bryan household.

At age 19, Luke was heading to Nashville when tragedy struck and his beloved older brother Chris was killed in an automobile crash. Luke stayed home, attended Georgia Southern University, and worked on his dad’s peanut farm — all the while playing music at night. In 2001, with his family’s insistence, Luke relocated to Nashville and landed a songwriting contract. He wrote for several renowned artists including Travis Tritt and performed his music at night. Capitol Records caught his show and signed him and, the rest, shall we say, is history.

The accolades poured in, and Luke Bryan’s career took off. He wrote a wealth of number one hits including Rain is a Good Thing, Kiss Tomorrow Goodbye, Fast, Crash My Party, That’s My Kind of Night, and numerous others. As his career skyrocketed so did the awards. Country Aircheck named Bryan the Most Heard Artist of the Last Decade. He’s won almost 50 major music awards and has amassed close to 30 number one hits. The awards continued. Luke Bryan became the first recipient of the ACM Album of the Decade for his Crash My Party Album of 2013. He’s been a CMT Artist of the Year six times and has sold over 12 million albums.

His latest sensational hit, But I Got A Beer In My Hand, which was written by Chase McGill, Matt Dragstrem, and Geoff Warburton, was produced by Jeff Stevens and co-produced by Jody Stevens, is in the Top Ten. This song comes on the heels of Luke’s 30th #1 single Country On, which ended the 2022 charts as the final #1 of the year. The release of Country On continues Luke’s record of 29 career #1 singles and 17.2 billion worldwide streams on country radio.

TG: Your song Country On is so uplifting.

LB: I love that the song uplifts the hardworking American people out there, and it brings a lot of unity. It just has feel-good vibes all the way around it and anytime you can reference country music fans in a song, and you can really make it feel natural, it’s great. And this song does just that.

Luke Bryan is a humanitarian in every sense of the word. He’s humble, gracious and incredibly charitable. He was honored as the 2021 Artist Humanitarian Award recipient for his numerous philanthropic undertakings. Luke’s Farm Tours are motivating. He began these tours in 2009 and thus far Luke Bryan has granted 83 college scholarships to students from farming families attending the local college or university near the places the tour performs.

He works tirelessly for St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital in Nashville where all children are treated for free, regardless of their circumstances. His support of the Make-A-Wish Foundation is inspirational. He lost his devoted sister Kelly in 2007 and her husband in 2014 after which Luke and his beloved wife Caroline became guardians for their nieces and nephew. Luke and Caroline are incredibly proud of their own two sons, Thomas “Bo” and Tatum “Tate” Bryan.

Bryan told the stories of his many successes and heartbreaks in November 2017 when he gave us a look at his life in Living Every Day: Luke Bryan. It’s a triumph told in the first person.

Luke will play his final dates of his record-breaking headline engagement at Resorts World Las Vegas, “Luke Bryan: VEGAS,” with six remaining shows — including New Year’s Eve!! — on December 29, 30 & 31, 2023 and January 3, 5 & 6, 2024. Tickets available at axs.com/lukeinvegas.

TG: Your tenure at Resorts World Las Vegas has been a huge success. Fans can still garner a seat; you have performances scheduled for late December and early January. It’s really a phenomenal and quite extraordinary show.

LB: We’ve worked long and hard to put together an incredible, high-energy show for the fans. I am so proud of how it turned out and I hope everyone who comes leaves there having as much fun as me.

My favorite place to be is on stage performing for country music fans. So thankful every night when I walk out on that stage and know you are there to have a blast along beside me. It never gets old.

Luke and NFL legend Peyton Manning recently hosted “The 57th Annual CMA Awards”; it’s a return engagement for these two talents and the show was a huge success. Next year Luke Bryan will return for a seventh season with Katy Perry and Lionel Richie as celebrity judges on ABC’s American Idol. January 17-20 Luke will headline two “Crash My Playa” concerts with special guest appearances by Dierks Bentley and Eddie Montgomery. Tickets are on sale now and there will be a host of additional performers. Log onto CrashMyPlaya.com to purchase packages and garner more information.

The post TG Coverguy: Luke Bryan appeared first on Travelgirl.

Carrie Underwood has won more than 100 awards including eight Grammys, 16 ACM Awards and was inducted into the Grand Ole Opry when she was a mere 26 years old. She is the most awarded female country artist for singles in RIAA (the Recording Industry Association of America®) history. She has recorded 28 number one singles, sold more than 85 million records and has the honor of being the most awarded female country singer.

In 2013 Underwood performed Sunday Night Football’s theme song, “Waiting All Day for Sunday Night,” which became a huge fan favorite. She’s starred in the NBC televised production of The Sound of Music playing the lead role of Maria.

This legendary luminary is also an entrepreneur and author. In 2014 Underwood launched CALIA, a line of fitness apparel, and in 2020 she penned released the self-help fitness and lifestyle book Find Your Path: Honor Your Body, Fuel Your Soul, and Get Strong with the Fit52 Life, a New York Times best seller.

Travelgirl: We are honored to have you aboard Travelgirl Magazine. You were born in Muskogee, Oklahoma, raised on a farm and loved growing up there. Oklahoma’s so proud of their hometown girl! I was at the Oklahoma Centennial when you brought down the house!!! In 2017, you were inducted into the Oklahoma Hall of Fame. Would you please talk about growing up in Oklahoma?

Carrie Underwood: Being raised in Checotah and in Oklahoma definitely shaped the person I am today. My parents taught me the importance of working hard and to always be grateful for what you have. I loved growing up on a farm as it taught me to appreciate the land, which probably helped plant the seeds for my love of land and gardening. Even now, when I visit my family in Oklahoma, I feel such a sense of peace. I can really just relax there.

TG: 2004 was a banner year for you. You were majoring in journalism and decided to try out for American Idol, which you won. You were on your way to stardom and you managed to return to school at Northeastern State University where you graduated magna cum laude with a B.A. in mass communications. How did you manage stardom so early and what prompted you to go back and finish college? Would you please share a few memories from that time in your life?

CU: The decision to audition for American Idol changed the entire trajectory of my life. I loved music and performing, but at that point I was planning to pursue a career in broadcast journalism. The idea that everything that came after that was more than I could have even dreamed for, let alone think it could actually happen. It was all such a whirlwind, in the best possible way.

TG: You’ve sold over 85 million records worldwide. You’ve won a wealth of awards including eight GRAMMY Awards, 16 ACM Awards including winning Entertainer of the Year three times. You ended 2022 as Billboard’s top Country female. You are a New York Times bestselling author and successful entrepreneur. Seven of your albums are certified multi-platinum or platinum by the RIAA. You were inducted as a member of the Grand Ole Opry in 2008 and were honored with a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame in 2018. How have you kept so grounded all these years? You are humble, gracious and give lots of time to worthwhile causes.

CU: Again, I credit my family with always teaching me to be grateful for the gifts God gives us and the blessings we enjoy every day. I’m very proud of what I’ve been able to achieve in my career but, more importantly, always remember the things that matter the most — faith, family, and gratitude.

TG: Please talk about your fitness app fit52, which you launched in 2020. Every Travelgirl will want to participate and get fit.

CU: fit52 is my app where I can share all the things I’ve learned about fitness and nutrition. My trainer, Eve Overland, and I have such a great time creating new content for the app and I love that we have created a community of people who want to share their journeys, whether they are just starting out on that path or are looking for new and different ways to approach working in working out into their lives.

TG: In December, 2021, you became the first artist to perform at the new Resorts World Theatre in Las Vegas; you actually opened this marvelous venue. Your show, REFLECTION: The Las Vegas Residency, garners rave reviews and you constantly perform to sold-out crowds. You will be on stage at Resorts World in September, November 30 and December. Please talk about your sensational show and performing in this marvelous arena. You dazzle the audience each evening.

CU: I love having our ongoing residency, REFLECTION. As much fun as it is to be on the road, which we were earlier this year with The Denim & Rhinestones Tour, it’s great to be able to be in one place and to put on a show that we could never move from city to city on a concert tour. We have some incredible set pieces and effects. When we were creating REFLECTION, we knew we really needed to put on a show worthy of the glitz and glamour of Las Vegas and the fun and energy of Nashville, and we’ve really accomplished that. I will always love being on the road and coming to the fans where they are, but it’s also really cool that we can be in Las Vegas for periods of time and perform a show we love for audiences who come from all over the world to see us.

TG: Do you have a favorite song and if so, what does it mean to you?

CU: Well, it’s not fair to choose one favorite… but of course Jesus, Take the Wheel will always have a special place in my heart. Not only was it the first single from my first album and the first hit, it just meant the world to be able to wear my faith on my sleeve and lay the groundwork for a career that melds who I am as a person and as an artist.

TG: Will you please talk about the C.A.T.S. Foundation and let our Travelgirl readers know how they can help.

CU: I wanted to create an organization that gave back to where I’m from, and helping to improve my hometown of Checotah, Oklahoma is extremely important to me. The C.A.T.S. Foundation (Checotah Animal, Town, and School Foundation) is all about giving back to the community I grew up in. We’ve helped out in all kinds of ways, from supporting the animal shelter, to the police and fire departments, to the schools (donating musical instruments and computer labs), and have been blessed enough to meet the needs of many different parts of the town. You can learn more about The C.A.T.S. Foundation on our website.

TG: Travelgirl readers will want to know if you have a favorite destination and what travel destinations are on Carrie Underwood’s bucket list.

CU: I’ve been so lucky to visit so many places here in the U.S. and around the world, I’m not sure I could pick just one. Anytime I’m able to squeeze in a little time for myself, I do love being near the water, whether it’s a pool, lake or the ocean. And visiting any vineyard anywhere always makes me a very happy girl.

TG: Do you have any sage advice for those young hopefuls out there who hope to one day walk in Carrie Underwood’s famous footsteps?

CU: Work hard and treat people the way you want to be treated. Always show up prepared and ready to do your job and never take a good opportunity for granted. Remember to have gratitude and humility.

TG: This month you are releasing Denim & Rhinestones (Deluxe Edition). What can we expect from that?

CU: I loved recording Denim & Rhinestones, which we released last year and we just couldn’t include everything we wanted to on the album. I knew I just had to extend the Denim & Rhinestones era so we are releasing the Deluxe Edition with six new tracks, on September 22.

TG: Tell us about your year-round channel, CARRIE’S COUNTRY, on SiriusXM.

CU: We launched CARRIE’S COUNTRY in June and it’s been so much fun getting to welcome listeners into my personal musical universe. I get to share my favorite music across all of the genres I love, from classic rock to the latest in country and a lot of special features highlighting everything from fitness to gardening, behind the scenes and more. fit52.com; thecatsfoundation.com

TG: Thank you for brightening all our lives.

The post Carrie Underwood: From American Idol to Superstar and Entrepreneur appeared first on Travelgirl.

The illustrious and uber-talented Michael Feinstein is a dynamic force in the world of music. He is a five Grammy Award nominee and has numerous Emmy nominations for his awe-inspiring PBS television specials. His work as an archivist has made him one of the most preeminent forces in music today. He is a distinguished and renowned performer, a composer and an arranger of his own original music.

Feinstein began his prolific career in his 20’s working alongside the legendary Ira Gershwin. Gershwin’s influence, along with Feinstein’s enormous talent, led the way to a remarkable career. He holds three honorary doctorates and is the noted author of The Gershwins & Me. Michael founded the Great American Songbook Foundation in 2007, which celebrates and preserves its music through educational programs, Master Classes, and the annual High School Songbook Academy. Michael devotes his time, his energy and his talent to numerous worthwhile causes and he serves on the Library of Congress’ National Recording Preservation Board.

Travelgirl: It’s a pleasure to see you again. As you know, I’m a huge fan. You were enchanting in Atlanta. What a performance and your storytelling about former Jewish performers was enlightening and entertaining. We were all mesmerized. The crowd stayed through several standing ovations.
Michael Feinstein: I appreciate that; I really do. Anytime I can perform the music I love is wonderful. Being Jewish is a part of who I am and life is about building bridges. We all have certain backgrounds and if one looks beneath the surface we find the common bond of humanity that is necessary for happiness and survival. I’m deeply affected by Judaism. It is a religion that at its core teaches about helping others. If one is given the gift of health and any kind of prosperity, it is incumbent for that person to give back in whatever way they can. I am mindful of that. Giving back is a pleasure and a natural thing for me.

When I left my hometown of Columbus, Ohio, at the age of 20, my grandmother had just gone into assisted living at the Heritage House, a Jewish residence for older folks in Columbus. When I moved to California, I started playing at the Jewish home for the aged twice a week. I did that just because I hoped someone would come and play for my grandmother in Ohio. I developed a great bond with the residents and I met amazing people. There was a man in there named Walter Schnell, who was a Holocaust survivor, and to hear his story was something. He was in an internment camp and was sent to a Jewish community in China, and he spent most of his years there. Walter’s stories of survival were so life-changing; how could anyone ever be the same after experiences like that!

My experience at the Jewish home was so powerful. My mother, who is 95, was just accepted as a resident in the Jewish home
and one of the reasons I was able to get her residency there was due to something I had done 40 years ago, without any thought of
reward for it. Life takes unexpected, beautiful turns.

TG: I understand you starting playing the piano by ear as a five-year-old. Your mother Florence was an amateur tap dancer and your father Edward was an amateur singer.
MF: My parents bought a new house and had saved $500 to buy furniture for the living room. My father impulsively said let’s get a piano because my parents loved music. There was so much music around our house. My mother had been a professional tap dancer until she married. I must have soaked up all of that music. When they bought this upright piano, and started playing the piano with both hands, right off the bat. My father was not home but my mother came into the room and asked me who had taught me to play and I told her no one had taught me. My mother didn’t believe me; she didn’t think it was possible for me to play the piano without some sort of instruction and I was sent to my room for lying.

TG: Whoa, seriously?
MF: Yes, seriously. I stayed in my room until my father came home later that night and realized I was playing the piano by ear. The ability to play like that is something that has always been with me, and it’s always been natural. I believe in reincarnation so I think I must have come in with some past memory that stuck.

TG: Who encouraged you and did you have a mentor in your early years in Columbus?
MF: No one really encouraged me. I’ve always been interested in spirituality. I believe that all beliefs fundamentally come back to a single truth. I’ve never been particularly religious but the more esoteric and spiritual aspects of Judaism I find quite attractive. It’s a feeling of being in direct contact with a divine presence.

TG: You moved to Los Angeles when you were 20. How did you meet the widow of Oscar Levant? I understand she introduced you to Ira Gershwin in July 1977 and you became his assistant. You’ve kept Gershwin and their music alive and prominent all these years. Would you talk about those years with Ira and the influences he had on you?
MF: Absolutely. Indeed I was introduced to Leonore Gershwin by Julie Levant with whom I had become friends by a series of amazing coincidences, even though now I don’t believe in coincidences. The moment I met Ira it felt just as if we were long lost cousins. There was an immediate connection regardless of the fact that he was 80 and I was 20. I began cataloging his phonograph records, which I thought would take a couple of weeks, but I ended up there for six months working just on that project. I would see Ira every day and he became fascinated by this 20-year old kid who knew so much about his work. He was at a point in his life where he thought the world had passed him by. Here was this young man who knew so much about his work, he almost found it freaky in the sense that I knew facts about his life that he didn’t know.

One day we had a gentle argument about what date something had happened. Ira said it was 1930 because this and this had happened, and I told him actually it was 1931 and I found a reference book to show him what the chronology was. Ira said okay, you are right, but you have an advantage over me and I asked what he meant. He told me he had only lived his life, but that I had totally researched it.

We had a very close and loving relationship because Ira had no children. He would have been a wonderful father but his wife didn’t want kids. So I became the surrogate son or grandson that he never had. It was life changing for me because I had moved to Los Angeles less a year earlier playing in piano bars trying to figure out what I was going to do with my life and suddenly things crystallized. I felt I had a greater purpose. I still played in piano bars, which was my main income until I was hired on a full time basis by Ira, and that lasted six years. That period, ages 20 to 26, is very impactful and important in anyone’s life. Those years helped to crystallize a lot of things in my world personally, spiritually and professionally.

TG: You are an incredibly talented performer, a composer, an arranger, a musical director and an author. You’ve received three honorary doctorates, and your book The Gershwins & Me is a best-seller published by Simon & Schuster. Which of one of your numerous talents most defines you? If I asked you what you are, what would you say?
MF: I would say LUCKY! I’ve been very lucky. I’m a singer, an interpreter of American popular song and a conservator of it. I’ve amassed this huge collection of music and artifacts relating to this music just to save and preserve it. I’m lucky that I can perform the music that I love because the world and the audiences are changing. I was in my late 20’s when my career began to garner national attention and yet I discovered music finds new fans. It doesn’t diminish in power.

TG: Please talk about your latest album, Gershwin Country.
MF: That was one of my most fulfilling projects in that it was unlike any other recording I’ve even done. Most of the other recordings I have created were completed rather quickly because most are taped live and are comparatively easy to create. Most pop records are built through production. This Gershwin album was certainly a departure for me in many ways. One, I had never done anything related to country music, and two, it was an album of duets. I had never wanted to record an album of duets because I usually found they were created for cynical reasons, for reasons of commerce.

This album was one I put together because I felt that Gershwin’s music was a certain kind of Americana as is country western, country as we call it now. It seemed like the album could be a bridge in combining two styles of music and genres that I thought could be complementary. Many of these songs were written for the stage and were created as duets. That seemed to be another element that would make organic sense. The hardest part of putting together a duet recording between a man and a woman was finding complementary keys. Usually a woman’s keys are four or five steps away from a man’s. These duets were very carefully created with vocal lines and harmonies so it’s a true collaboration. It had a real purpose of combining the emotion of two different hearts and souls to tell the story.

TG: You’ve joined forces with Jean-Yves Thibaudet presenting Two Pianos: Who Could Ask for Anything More. Please talk about the collaboration and what sparked this amazing collaboration?
MF: Johnny Thibaudet is one of the greatest living concert pianists. He truly is a global sensation in that he plays concerts in every corner of the world. He plays a varied repertoire. In other words, many concert pianists will do a tour where they play the same repertoire with an orchestra in recitals in different cities; it’s one program. He plays multiple programs with great depth and interpretive brilliance and his musical palette is very, very broad.

We’ve been friends for 30 years. We became closer through the years and talked about collaborating but couldn’t figure out what it would be because our worlds are so different. Our approach to music is different. I play mainly extemporaneously, and he doesn’t.

He plays mainly what’s on the page better than anybody. We realized that the bridge of Gershwin was a common bond. When he was 13 growing up in France he discovered the world of Gershwin and it changed his life. I had the same experience.

It was that shared love for something that transcends culture and time and space that brought us together. We put together a program that is primarily American popular song although it does include Rhapsody in Blue, and we present the music largely played on two pianos. Gershwin loved two pianos and often wrote for two pianos and then I sing, of course.

The Gershwin songs, along with the music of Richard Rogers and other composers of the era, are presented in a style that is in some ways more authentic to the composers original intention but also has more of a contemporary sensibility to it. The programs have been received rapturously. We just did two nights with the Boston Pops, which was our first incarnation of this program with a symphony orchestra and there was pandemonium in the audience. The reaction was so fervent and touching and we are definitely on to something, and we are thrilled. It brings together two different audiences that seem to be very complementary.

TG: I spent a day interviewing your dear friend Liza Minnelli. Please talk about Liza and your upcoming touring show, Get Happy, a tribute to Judy Garland.
MF: I’m very proud of this program that pays tribute to Judy Garland. It’s one of the hardest things I’ve ever had to assemble. The enormity of her talent and legend is such that I didn’t know that I had the wherewithal to properly convey her greatness. It truly is because of Liza that I continued to pursue the project because I was ready to give it up at any point if I couldn’t give it justice. I didn’t want to do anything that was half baked. As I continued to assemble the program, as I figured out what it should be and shouldn’t be, I enlisted the aid of several wonderful people including John Fricke, who has an archive of thousands of photographs of Garland and Judy Garland’s family. That stockpile of material along with things that Liza and her family made available to me helped me to assemble a program that is very historical and very entertaining with anecdotes. It celebrates the incredible art that she, as a performing artist, displayed even from her earliest years. I realized that I had the opportunity to tell her story focusing on the talent, her singing and her legacy as opposed to the tabloid stuff.

It celebrates Judy Garland; it doesn’t whitewash anything, but it focuses on the enduring part of her legacy. The response of people in the audience has been quite extraordinary. There is something about her energy that is very personal to people and very powerful. There are numerous visuals in the show, several film clips and there’s audio including a lost recording of hers that I found and in which I accompany her. The cumulative effect is extraordinary. Part of the time people are looking at the visuals while I am singing and I don’t mind that at all because the show is about her and I am the tour guide, if you will.

TG: Your bio is so prolific it’s hard to put it all into an interview. Your Emmy Award-nominated TV special, Michael Feinstein – The Sinatra Legacy, which was taped live in 2011 was a huge success. You were the Principal Pops Conductor for the Pasadena POPS and you serve as Artistic Director of the Palladium Center for the Performing Arts in Carmel, Indiana Indiana. Your performance schedule is extraordinary. Where does this incredible energy and passion come from?
MK: Well, thank you. As far as energy goes I believe the universe provides infinite energy and one of the feelings of contemporary society is the lack of and recognition of the understanding that there is a source of infinite energy that is available to us. I focus on that spiritual energy. Having the great gift of being able to do something I love isn’t something I do not take for granted.

TG: I’m a huge fan of the Great American Songbook. Please talk about your passion for preserving the music and songs of the Great American Songbook and created The Great American Songbook Foundation, which you founded in 2007.
MF: The Great American Songbook Foundation is something I created a number of years ago for the purpose of preserving the American popular music that is so important to me. I felt it was in danger of disappearing in that someone needed to bring attention to the music for younger generations. I created it to not only preserve the amazing artifacts that I’ve accrued through the years but also to educate and introduce young people to the songbook.

I find that when young people hear these songs they like them; they respond to them. They have meaning and resonance and this music takes its place next to whatever pop music they listen to. I felt it was created just to preserve something that mattered to me where I felt there was a need for an organization to focus on that.

The foundation has grown by leaps and bounds. We are building a museum. We are proud to be a Grammy Foundation affiliate and only a few other museums can claim that honor.

In addition we created a summer academy, The Great American Songbook Academy. Forty young people from all over the United States come and participate for one week. It is songbook intensive and they learn about American popular music and thus they can add this music to their lives. Through music you can create healing; you can teach anything and music has the potential to offer tremendous transformation and that is certainly a mission for me.

TG: Please tell us how to contribute to this noble cause.
MF: At its core music is one of the most important forces in the world, in the universe. In its most simplistic terms think of soldiers going off to battle bolstered by the music that is being played as they march. The music transforms, heals, inspires, raises consciousness, and offers hope. All of that is encoded into any given piece of music. To bring awareness of this, especially to young people, is a holy pursuit.

Like all nonprofit arts organizations we are always happy for like-minded souls to contribute in any way they see fit. People tend to devalue the arts. People don’t think that contributing to an arts organization is as important as contributing to a cancer or similar organization but they both offer healing in different ways. To me they are equally important.The arts unites people from different backgrounds and helps them find common ground. It transforms and heals. I’ve seen it time and time again, starting with those days when I started playing in convalescent and retirement homes. I saw many whose quality of life improved through music. There is research that shows that people who have music played during their last days on earth need 40 percent less medications. There are scientific proven effects of music played for people who are ill and going through transition. It is all quite extraordinary. The experience of being involved in music is the greatest blessing of my life.

TG: Your travel schedule keeps you constantly on the road. Is there one item one of the most legendary performers never leaves home without?
MF: I am vegan and I never leave home without protein powder. I also have a deck of oracle cards that I travel with called The Cosmic Deck of Initiation because it moves me to my heart. I also always have that, and a little book called The Quiet Mind.

TG: Your music has made a difference in the lives of so many people. Your preservation of the Great America Songbook will last the test of time, and we’re very grateful. Thank you.

The post THE MARVELOUS MICHAEL FEINSTEIN appeared first on Travelgirl.

The marvelous Marsha Mason has been enormously triumphant in several wildly varied careers. She was nominated four times for an Oscar for her performances in Cinderella Liberty, The Goodbye Girl, Chapter Two and Only When I Laugh. She’s also had an extensive Broadway and London stage career, wowing audiences when she starred in Cinderella Liberty, Cactus Flower, The Prisoner of Second Avenue and Steel Magnolias. Her work with her then-husband, Neil Simon, is legendary and he based some of his plays on their relationship, most notably Chapter Two. She’s also appeared in several films including Blume in Love, The Cheap Detective, Frasier (receiving an Emmy nomination) and most recently appearing as Arlene in the Netflix series, Grace and Frankie. She’s been an organic farmer, a successful race car driver, an actress and a director. Travelgirl’s Renee Werbin recently caught up with the exuberant and talented Marsha Mason who resides in Connecticut.

Travelgirl: I’m so happy to see you again. You have had so many different careers. You were an organic farmer, a race car driver, an award-winning actress and director.
Marsha Mason: I’ve had a very full life.

TG: Which career was the most fun and which defines you the most?
MM: Acting and directing are the most fun but they are hard work. Your stamina has to be in order; you have to be in good shape to do eight performances a week. Recently I directed and starred in Lost in Yonkers for the stage, and we had a big, huge success with that. The acting, in terms of my career, was the most defining.

I had such enormous success with Cinderella Liberty and I wasn’t really ready for the success that happened so quickly; it scared me. I didn’t know how to handle it. I was naïve and I needed to grow up, which I was able to do that on the farm.

My then husband, Neil Simon, was a great protector. When I look back now, I think one of the reasons we worked so well together was because I felt so protected by him; ultimately a little too protected because Neil was so controlling. It was a wonderful relationship and I don’t regret any of it. I gained two beautiful daughters, Ellen and Nancy, whom Neil was raising alone after the death of his wife. The girls are still close to me today and now we have grandchildren and a great-grandchild. The girls and I love each other and that’s really cool. I gained so much experience in those years.

TG: You were marvelous in the role of Arlene on Grace and Frankie. It must have been enchanting working on the set with those two great actresses. I interviewed Jane Fonda for a Travelgirl cover years and years ago and she was an absolute treasure.
MM: Jane Fonda and Lily Tomlin are the cutest, totally charming, most down-to-earth fabulous women. I am in awe of both of them, especially because of their energy and their commitment, which is so strong. I think it’s phenomenal to me at their age what they have accomplished and what they are still accomplishing. They are wonderful to work with. Both are gracious, kind and considerate and I enjoyed every moment of working with them.

TG: You built a very successful business and a beautiful home during your time in Santa Fe.
MM: I did. I loved my time there. I built an Argentinean estancia and I started growing medicinal, organic herbs and became a biodynamic farmer. I began growing the business by selling fresh herbs to a man named Daniel Gagnon. I developed my product line with Mitch Coven of Vitality Works. He was making individual products for private label companies and I sold my products to him for a couple of years. The products were marvelous.

I remember when I was heading to London with Richard Dreyfuss to perform in Prisoner of Second Avenue. I thought since I’m going to be in a 400-year-old theatre – the RoyalHay Market – I knew I was going to need something for my immune system and my voice. So we, with my team in Santa Fe, created a salve for our hands. I was ahead of the curve with my medicinal products. I started out locally and then we started giving lectures for the Vitality Works people. We even created a skin and body care line using fair trade shea butter as the base and adding my herbs.

TG: Your organic farm became wildly successful, didn’t it?
MM: It did and in the process, I fell in love with and found my signature herb. It is called Spilanties and it is native to South America. It is called the toothache herb because it is anti-viral and anti-bacterial. The tribes in South America would put the flour from this herb on their teeth if they had any kind of infection. We obtained some seeds from a European company and started growing Spilanties and it became our signature herb in everything that we made.

TG: Do you still own the company?
MM: No. I sold the farm in 2014 and then I sold off the products. I still have all the recipes. What was really extraordinary, in those 20 some-odd years, was that the farm matured me as an individual. I learned to be an entrepreneur, a businesswoman, and I gained a great deal of patience. I learned to have patience. I feel the experience on the farm turned me into a better actor and a better director.

The business changed in the late 80’s and 90’s and I was missing both the theatre and New York. I started thinking about selling the farm. It took quite a while for me to make the move because I had built a big operation. I found a wonderful person who bought it and she and her husband have kept it as a farm, which is what I had hoped would happen. The land out there became desirable and people started buying it up to build houses and I didn’t want the farm to disappear. Fortunately, it’s still there and it looks beautiful. The couple who bought it has done phenomenal things; they still grow medicinal herbs. They grow organic alfalfa, because we did. They’ve practically put the whole farm on solar power.

TG: How did you get into race car driving? I know Paul Newman was the impetus and you were good friends.
MM: I was on a plane with Paul going from New York to Los Angeles. Paul was going out to Riverside in California because they were closing a racetrack and he invited me out to watch him race.

I was interested and that interest was sparked when I was in high school. My best friend’s father had a track outside of St. Louis. We spent our Sundays handing out Pit Passes to the guys who raced. There was just something out there in that environment that intrigued me. I remember looking at the way the men would wrap individual pieces of their engine in oil cloth; they took really good care of their cars. I vividly remember their intense concentration. The smell, the speed, the whole thing captured my imagination.

I had totally forgotten about those days. Whenever I could, I would fly out to wherever Paul was racing. I bought a Mazda RX3, met LA lawyer Marc Staenberg and he suggested we team up. Together we created a mom and pop operation. I enrolled in a driving school, which I didn’t even know existed. I took a course at the Bob Bondurant School, then went to Skip Barber Racing School.

I then met Mike Lewis, an SCCA (Sports Car Club of America) champion. Mike built me my own Mazda GT3 car and I drove his old championship car for a couple of seasons. I had gotten into car racing in a serious way. We had three cars, a truck and a crew and for a long time I was a race car driver!

TG: Would you get into a race car today?
MM: I actually signed up for a race in May. I’m going to try and see what happens. I could never race competitively again because I think our reflexes are slower as we age but I want to see if everything I learned about driving is still at my fingertips.

TG: You should have been on every magazine cover in the world when you were racing. Not that many women get in race cars even today and in those days, you were the girl!!!
MM: I have a vivid memory of being in Monterey and the men around me at the track weren’t quite sure what to make of me. I stayed out of their way and I learned. Eventually Mike Lewis and the crew encouraged me to become competitive and I started to pass these guys. On the track I had a couple of accidents that were not my fault, but I was very calm and collected and handled it all very well.

TG: How did you meet Neil Simon?
MM: I met Neil the first day of rehearsal on The Good Doctor. I auditioned for him. My agent had encouraged me to audition for a Broadway show. I auditioned and read the governess part and had to read it cold because I hadn’t prepared it. I read and went back to my agent’s office and thought I would receive a call back and my agent laughed; she told me they had already hired me. I made it on Broadway on my first try. I packed up everything I owned and moved back to New York. I went into rehearsals on October 3 and Neil and I were married on October 27 — two weeks later — and we lasted 10 years. We raised the girls and did wonderful work together and had immense respect for each other.

TG: Tell me about The Goodbye Girl.
MM: That was a wonderful experience. The original script was called Bogart Slept Here, which was a loose adaptation of Midnight Cowboy. It was based on the idea of a young actor with a family getting a chance to do a big movie and becoming an overnight success.

Neil rewrote the story and it became a whole new movie. I auditioned with Richard Dreyfuss and we had this immediate chemistry. We didn’t know each other but the chemistry was there. It took us all —Richard, me and Ray Stark (the producer) and Neil — by surprise. Ray hired Herb Ross to direct and he quickly hired Quinn Cummings to play the little girl and in those days you could rehearse. We were on the set rehearsing before we started the picture. We went to New York to do the exteriors and went back to LA to finish up. We had no idea if the film would be successful but fortunately the universe was with us. All the cards seemed to indicate that people were happy to have a movie they could take their kids to. All the single mothers totally related to my character’s, Paula’s, problems. The success of The Goodbye Girl wasn’t something we had anticipated.

TG: What’s next for the illustrious Marsha Mason?
MM: I’m in talks with the Hartford Stage Company to do a play there for the 24-25 season. I am very busy working on a project with a workshop about two young boys in Australia in the 1950’s who competed for the Olympics. One of the boys ended up choosing to attend Harvard instead of being in the Olympics. It’s sort of a biographical story of a boy and his journey.

It was originally a film and one of the producers suggested making it into a play and the playwright, who coincidentally also wrote Drop Dead Fred, called me. We started working on the script together and found we had a very good creative partnership.

I went to Montreal and worked with a wonderful circus group, who through their actions on stage, I realized I could handle both the physicality and the emotionality of the play. My next step is to do a integrate both in a workshop. The Alley Theatre in Houston is intrigued and excited about the possibilities of this play and is willing to give us a workshop. I just need to raise more money to pay the acrobats. As you know, nonprofits are having a bit of a hard time now.

We are also working to see if we can turn Drop Dead Fred into a musical. We will see what happens. Meanwhile, I’m reading plays and I’m still auditioning and probably will go out to LA for pilot season. We will see.

TG: You can be sure Travelgirl will be watching!!!

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TRAVELGIRL:  I am so happy to welcome you aboard. You’ve had this incredible renaissance in the past year…a celebrated album, appearing in Questlove’s Oscar winning film Summer of Soul and a second honor on Hollywood’s Walk of Fame. So let’s start from the beginning. Please talk about founding The Fifth Dimension.  Where did the name originate? You began as the Versatiles but changed your name early on and became quite a phenomenon. You were instantly beloved and your hits are still sung today.  You created iconic music together. 

MARILYN MCCOO and BILLY DAVIS JR.:  (Billy) I traveled to Los Angeles from St. Louis because I wanted to develop a recording career. I wanted to work with Motown and back then Motown was the only agency pushing black music to the top. I didn’t want to travel to Detroit because I knew there would be long, long lines of people with the same dreams so I went to California to try and succeed. I had grown up with LaMonte McLemore, who was out in LA, and I called LaMonte and asked if he knew of anyone at the Motown Office on the West Coast. I was fortunate; he did and he got me an appointment and an audition. I was put on a waitlist. In the meantime LaMonte and I were living together and we talked about starting a recording group as a hobby and that’s exactly what we did. 

Marilyn: I knew LaMonte and had become part of the recording group. At that time Marc Gordon was running the Los Angeles Motown office and he was also a record producer. LaMonte approached Marc about our group. Marc agreed to hear us perform. He took us into his studio to record because he wanted the Motown people in Detroit to hear us. After Marc left Motown he reached out and said he would like to manage us because he believed in our talent. That’s how we started out and at the time we called ourselves the Versatiles.

TG: You were performing as the Versatiles. How did you become the Fifth Dimension?

Marilyn: Do you remember Johnny Rivers? Johnny’s success led him to found his own record company. He wanted to record some R & B because he loved R & B music. He contacted Marc Gordon, who was our manager at the time, and Marc introduced our group to Johnny. We ended up recording a song called “Go Where You Want to Go” and the decision was made to release our song as a single. Our name, at that time, was the Versatiles but Johnny Rivers thought our name was rather old-fashioned. He suggested we find something new. Everyone went home and started working on new names for our group. Ron Townson, the other male member of our group, along with his wife, came up with the name The Fifth Dimension; we thought the name was so cool. Johnny Rivers loved the name and, as they say, the rest is history. 

TG: Your group, The Fifth Dimension, sold millions of albums, won six Grammys and had dozens of top ten hits. You were in constant demand to perform on a wealth of television shows.  How did this fame change your lives?

Billy: We began to be recognized wherever we went.

Marilyn: When The Fifth Dimension was touring, we were traveling through airports and all of a sudden people knew who were were. They would stop us and ask for our autographs. We traveled constantly and barely had time to know which airport we were connecting through; we were so busy in those days. We starting signing autographs and realized people really knew who we were. 

Billy: When we were heard our music on the radio it was a real thrill for us. 

Marilyn: It was a great thrill accomplishing what we had dreamed of when we were growing up. 

Billy: People we knew from our childhood, from high school and college, wanted to come and see us and we loved that. We were just thankful. Fame never changed us but it made us feel like we were accomplishing our dreams.

Marilyn: We were on the Ed Sullivan Show a number of times. Ed Sullivan was one of the people who introduced The Fifth Dimension to the world. He had us on his well-known show a number of times. We worked with so many talented and famous people including Sinatra who we worked with in Las Vegas. About that time CBS gave us our own television series. We were a summer replacement and we decided to make some of the story on our show about hanging out on the road. Jay Leno ended up playing the part of our road manager. Of course this was before Jay became “Jay Leno”!

Billy: Once we left the group we had the chance to work with stars like Sonny and Cher, Dolly Parton, Janet Jackson and Johnny Carson. After we left the group in 1975 the group continued to prosper and The Fifth Dimension is still prospering and working today.

TG: The hits just kept coming. “Let the Sunshine In”, “Stoned Soul Picnic, “Wedding Bell Blues”, “Up Up and Away”, and, while continuing these great hits, you married in 1969. The Fifth Dimension slowed down and you went out on your own. You found unbelievable success. “You Don’t Have to be a Star” is an iconic song. You became the first African American couple to ever host a network variety TV show and you both became known as America’s First Couple of Pop & Soul. Please talk about heading out on your own. 

Marilyn: We often talked about our lives and our group. We had enjoyed amazing success when we were with The Fifth Dimension but in the back of our hearts we were wondering what would happen if we went out on our own as the solo artists that we had hoped to be. Things started slowing down with the group. We started disagreeing on which direction we wanted the group to go in. It was then that Billy and I decided to go and see what would happen with our careers if we tried something new.         

Billy: We decided that since we had struck out on our own we would try to make our songs totally different. When we were putting our show together we decided not to perform any Fifth Dimension music in our performances at all. We decided to have new shows. We were getting standing ovations but we learned early on that our fans wanted us to perform our Fifth Dimension music. We quickly learned that what we thought was a bright idea was really a terrible idea so we put the songs we were known for back in our show.

TG: You recently recorded the album Blackbird: Lennon-McCartney Icons. It’s your first new album in three decades and it’s absolutely fabulous. It is a paean to Civil Rights as Human Rights. The album placed you back on the Billboard charts and the Number 1 position on several music charts including the R&B iTunes chart.  

Billy: We had been including some Beatles melodies in our show for quite some time. We were already singing Blackbird. Our producer asked us about Blackbird, about that melody. We knew Paul McCartney had written this about civil and human rights and this was very important to us. Our producer Nic Mendoza, came up with the suggestion of doing the album. We realized young people want to know how we feel about what’s going on in our world today. 

Marilyn: The young people today see what’s happening in our world and in our country and they are concerned. We were talking to Nic about this; about how we are also concerned with what’s happening with civil rights in our country right now. We talked more and more about this and we decided that this was the direction we could go in. We could sing about something that was important to us and something that also connected to the young people’s concerns today. 

Billy: Without getting on a soap box preaching, it should be justice for all. 

TG: What decision led you to record this incredible album? You had been away from the recording studio for so long and it’s amazing that you decided to record it during the pandemic. How was that experience?  

Marilyn: It was interesting. We hadn’t been in the studio recording for quite some time so when we went back into the studio to do Blackbird we realized things had changed a bit. 

Billy: The technical part of recording has changed dramatically. The way recordings are put together now is quite different from when we first began recording. Going back into the studio was just like riding a bike for us. It all came back instantly and we were very comfortable. It was just like old times. 

Marilyn: It was amazing to us to see how knowledgeable the young people were and we immediately realized how much Nic knew. We were thrilled with the people Nic brought in to work with him in producing our music. 

TG: Supermodel and super mogul Kathy Ireland is executive producer on this album, and also manages your career.    

Marilyn: Kathy has been an amazing friend and wonderful addition to our career at this period in our lives. We are so thankful to have her by our side. It was Kathy’s belief in who we were and what we represent and in the fact that we still have something to offer to the music business that lit the spark. It was Kathy’s faith in what we stood for that really opened up the door and allowed us to go into the studio and make this project happen. 

Billy: She’s a wonderful friend and a beautiful support for us. The team she put together has been amazing. These young people truly know what they are doing.

TG: What projects are you working on now and what is coming up next for you?    

Billy: We have a couple of new recording projects upcoming with the label EE1. Our next album will be produced by Nic Mendoza who worked with us on the Blackbird project and we are excited about this. We have some covers on the way as well. 

Marilyn: We’ve been elated with the response we’ve had on the Blackbird project. In the interviews we’ve done we’ve been amazed and impressed with the positive comments we’ve had.  It’s wonderful to be back recording and the reviews amaze us. 

TG: Your marriage is the stuff dreams are made of. You’ve been together married for over 52 years. The fact that you also have a career performing together all these years is incredibly impressive. Can you give our Travelgirl readers some advice on how to maintain a successful marriage?  

Marilyn: Friendship; that’s how our union started out. 

Billy: When we started out we constantly confided in one another even when we were going to rehearsals and when we went to parties. We would sit together and talk when everyone else was up dancing. We were getting into each other’s minds and hearts. Our friendship was so important to us.

Marilyn: We didn’t realize at that time, when we were going back and forth to rehearsals and sitting and talking to each other at parties, that this relationship was coming together. We just thought of each other as buddies. It was the strengthening of our friendship and the respect we had for each other that was coming together. If you want to have a strong marriage you need to have a strong friendship. 

Billy: Once our hearts started changing. We did get a bit scared; we didn’t want to lose our friendship. We wondered, was this a good idea? Thank goodness it was meant to be. 

Marilyn: The Lord was truly with us. 

TG: Travelgirl readers would love to know if you have a favorite travel destination. Is there some place you love to visit and do you have a destination you haven’t traveled to yet that’s on your bucket list?

Billy: One of the great places that we traveled to recently was South Africa. It’s amazing, even as a kid I always wanted to walk on the land where the animals walk free and we got a chance to see that. It’s was just remarkable to be able to give the animals the respect they deserve. 

Marilyn: South Africa was such an amazing the trip; the land, the people, the culture; each day was exciting. Getting to see that amazing statue of Mandela in Pretoria was incredible. Billy and I are trying to figure out where we want to go next. We haven’t been to South America yet.

TG: Is there one item you never leave home without when you are packing for a trip? 

Billy: Yes, we make sure we have our Bibles with us. 

Marilyn: We are strong Christians; our faith is very important to us. The Lord has blessed us and our careers in so many ways.

TG: Can you share some sage advice for those budding young hopefuls who hope to one day follow in your famous footsteps? 

Marilyn: Absolutely. You have to believe in yourself. If there is something that’s really important to you and to your life then you have to go for it. We share this with the young people we work with all the time.

TG: You are very involved with the Los Angeles Team Mentoring, which guides middle school children to successful lives. LATM honored you with their Dream Big award for their civil rights and human rights advocacy.  Can you please talk about this most worthwhile charity and how you became involved? 

Billy: We have always been interested in helping children. From the United Negro College Fund to now; we always want to help children. 

Marilyn: Young people have to be taught to believe in themselves. The Los Angeles Team Mentoring does this. We love the fact that they work with middle school age children. We feel like the middle school years are a very important time to be planting positive seeds in a child’s life. These mentors teach children to work hard and not give up and that’s so important in life.

Billy: The Los Angeles Team Mentoring includes three mentors, a teacher, a college student and someone from the business community. We love that these accomplished people really guide these kids and instill hope in them.

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     He’s earned a Golden Globe Award (for Say You, Say Me), four Grammy Awards, and the distinction of being named MusiCares Person of the Year in 2016. Richie was a Kennedy Center honoree in 2017 and in 2018 his handprints and footprints were immortalized in cement at the TCL Chinese Theatre IMAX in Hollywood alongside other celebrated musical, comedic, and cinematic giants.  

     The past March Lionel Richie became the recipient of the distinguished Library of Congress Gershwin Prize for Popular Song, which honored his lifetime contributions to popular music. He was feted with an all-star tribute concert in Washington, D.C. and the celebration will be broadcast nationally on PBS stations on May 17 at 9 p.m. EST.

     A songwriting genius, Richie is known for his mega-hits such as Lady, Hello, Endless Love, All Night Long, Penny Lover, Stuck on You, and Dancing on the Ceiling. This giant of music co-wrote the iconic We Are the World, for the USA for Africa fundraiser that generated more than $60 million in donations and also sold millions of records.

   He began his career as part of the R & B group the Commodores, writing memorable top 10 hits such as Three Times a Lady, Still, and Easy. It’s no surprise that Richie has the distinction of writing songs that turned into No. 1 hits for more than 11 consecutive years.

   His musical achievements are legendary; he received the George and Ira Gershwin Lifetime Achievement Award in 2008 and was named a judge in 2018 on ABC’s mega-hit American Idol. He’s revered on the show for his passion, empathy and enthusiasm, which he generously shares with the numerous contestants.

   Philanthropy is always a priority for Lionel. He works tirelessly for numerous philanthropic causes including the Breast Cancer Research Foundation where he helped raise more than $3.1 million. He credits his grandmother, who survived breast cancer in her 80s and lived to be over 100 years old, as his inspiration in supporting this great cause. 

   He’s passionate about a wealth of worthy causes. He spends his time and his efforts helping at-risk and disadvantaged youth, those suffering from Parkinson’s Disease, UNICEF, his alma mater, Tuskegee University, and a host of other worthwhile charitable foundations and causes. 

   In 2019 Richie was named Global Ambassador and Chairman of the Global Ambassador Group for the Prince’s Trust, a charity founded in 1976 by Charles, Prince of Wales. The same year he was also honored at the Keep Memory Alive’s 23rd Annual Power of Love Gala in Las Vegas where he helped raise over $10 million for the Cleveland Clinic Nevada. The monies raised were used to provide service, care, and resources for those suffering from cognitive diseases. 

     Don’t miss the opportunity to see his show Lionel Richie — Back to Las Vegas! at the Encore Theatre at Wynn Las Vegas. Tickets for performances went on sale in early April and he has a host of concerts throughout 2022. 

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Travelgirl: I’ve followed you for years and years. I first became enamored when you launched Bizarre Foods and I’ve been a fan ever since. I wondered how you could eat the most unusual and sometimes rather ghastly things. You always had a smile and something endearing and enchanting to say. Was there one food item that didn’t appear enticing but really surprised you?
Andrew Zimmern: There have been so many. I remember the fertilized 14-to-16-day-old duck eggs in the Philippines. They were certainly something I had no idea I would enjoy, but I adored them. There were spicy, deep fried tiny little birds, which are available in jungle markets all over the world. They weren’t something I would think about every week, but I love them — they are delicious.
   There are hundreds of sorts of Dr. Seuss-type animal experiences where you have no idea until you get to a place that certain foods are eaten there. For instance, iguana eggs don’t have a hard shell. The white shell on the outside of an iguana egg is rubbery and elastic. When it’s cooked you have to nip it with your teeth and suck the egg out, yet it’s delicious. People around the world do eat yummy food.

TG: It sounds as if nothing edible frightens you.
AZ: No, nothing.

TG: Where did your love of food come from? I’m Jewish and I bake challah. I make gefilte fish, kreplach, brisket, kugels — all types of Jewish food — and oddly enough, my mother never cooked. But my mother-in-law was a fabulous cook. Who inspired you? You have a great love of food.
AZ: My parents and grandparents got me started. Some of my friends’ mothers loved to cook and many would take cooking lessons at the 92nd street Y in the late 60’s and early 70’s. These moms would come back with incredible recipes. I was entranced and I wanted to cook everything that I could get my hands on.
    I started working in professional kitchens in the summer of 1975. As a teenager that was my job and my love of cooking took off from there. As far as inspiration, I think I’ve drawn the biggest inspiration in a sense from the home cooks I’ve met over the years. They are the real masters of a specific dish or craft. I’ve known and I’ve worked in many kitchens under many famous chefs. I could rattle off a name and it’s a nice sound bite and I learned a lot in those kitchens. But when it comes to inspiration, it’s the home cooks. It’s experiences such as spending time in the home of an Italian family in Ravello, watching this family make meatballs in a way that I’ve never seen before. This knowledge can literally change my relationship to that food and how I cook it. This is what inspires me.
 
TG: I’ve read about AZ Canteen and would have loved to have been in Minnesota when you opened it. You’ve showcased not just food from around the world, but the history of food and that’s really interesting.
AZ: You’ve got to learn about the food first and then you can fall in love with it. You’re on the right track.

TG: You were born in New York, but live in Minnesota. Atlantans are very delighted you’ve set your sights on our great city partnering with and developing Chattahoochee Food Works. I do want to recognize the fact that Scott Selig, of blessed memory, was the impetus behind this development in the beginning. What most interested you in the project?
AZ: It dates back to the City of Atlanta for which I have an incredible love and abiding passion for. My family came over to the United States in the early 19th century and came into the port of Charleston. They were German Jews and meat cutters and they made their way to Atlanta, which was a booming bustling city. They wound up heading north to New York City after the Civil War.
   I’m a very modern scientific person. I’m sitting at a table talking to you and this table is extremely solid — it’s a 500-pound slab of red oak. It is rock solid and I could drop something on it and it’s impervious, but science tells me it’s actually not solid. Science tells me it’s a swirling mass of electrons, right? I feel pretty stable in my chair, but I know the earth is 19 degrees tilted and spinning through space at 20,000 miles an hour so not everything is at it appears to be.
    When I am in Atlanta, instantly I can feel the change. If I was blindfolded and I was flown somewhere, I truly believe if I landed in Atlanta, I could name the city when I got off the plane by how my skin felt. That could be just in my head, but I have and always have had, an affinity for Atlanta. That’s the reason I work with an Atlanta nonprofit called The Giving Kitchen. My relationship with The Giving Kitchen predates my relationship with the Seligs and my partnership with Bobby Montwaid and the idea of developing the food hall in Atlanta.
    Atlanta is a special place for me. I saw the building itself, then I met the Selig family and I fell in love with them. I believe because of that combination, and of the scope of the project which includes the architecture itself, the physical space, the building and the series of brick single-story units spread out over 90 acres, I felt it was going to be something really special. My partner Bobby and I wanted to be a part of that.

TG: You curated and selected the restaurants. What was the criteria to become one of the 31 vendors in this 25,000-square-foot food hall?
AZ: Curation and selection are quite a bit different today than it was years ago. We had an idea of what sort of mix we were looking for. You have to curate and select vendors and determine a menu mix for the food hall. When we started, we made phone calls to every food person in Atlanta and then COVID shut the country down. There was the idea that everything would be mothballed for a while.
While I was off shooting my television shows, my partner literally went to Atlanta every other week and just walked and talked to people. You have to remember most restaurants were closed. The ones that were open were serving at only 25 percent or they were just doing to-go orders or some sort of delivery or take-out. My partner would visit these restaurants. He would ask where the best tacos and other sorts of foods were located and they would tell him. One by one, working the phones and working the streets together, we found some incredible entrepreneurs. These entrepreneurs had to put their dreams on hold for more than 12 to 14 months due to COVID.
The people in the food hall, they are our partners, together they make up the rich tapestry of the experience of walking in there. This is not about Bobby or me; it’s not about selection or curation. I actually think it’s about the kismet of these incredible entrepreneurs who stuck it out and wound up persevering. Their stories are absolutely staggering and inspirational, and they make this collection of vendors what it is today.
For instance, it’s about the two friends who always wanted to make pizza together. It’s the mom and dad with eight children who are doing their take on their grandmother’s soul food. It’s the young South African kid who is doing some inspired food based on the food he grew up with. And it’s the pair of twins who for years, spanning decades, have worked for some of the best Mexican chefs in the country. These twins wanted to start their own business selling some incredible food, tacos, and other things and they are able to do it here. It really is a magical collection of people.

TG: I am sure for many of the chefs this is their first physical brick-and-mortar restaurant. What advice can you offer so that one day some of these chefs can walk in your famous footsteps
AZ: You just get up every day and you keep doing the right thing. I am certainly no one special. I just said yes to the next right thing. It sounds really cliché, but that’s rather complex because you are faced with hundreds of decisions every day and saying yes to the good stuff and saying no to the bad stuff takes practice. You may make mistakes, but at the end of the day, if your heart is in the right place, and you genuinely want to do things for other people, which I believe is our purpose here on earth, incredible things will come to pass.

TG: This is not your first food hall project. What attracts you to food halls both as a consumer and as a food expert?
AZ: First and foremost, the people and the stories attract me to food halls. I was at the Thursday night market in Berlin, which is one of the most famous food halls in the world. There are hundreds of vendors and it’s an extraordinary place. People come from all over Europe to sell there. There is a booth occupied by Dutch fishermen, a collective where they bring oysters and herring and all types of things, and it’s quite exceptional. There’s a booth that rotates every month, and it’s given to vendors as an opportunity to cook and raise money for whatever reasonable nonprofit or cause the group wants to raise money for.
   The last time I was there I saw this lamb dish. It was a Syrian dish and I remembered there was a huge influx of Syrian refugees in Germany. I went over to see what the booth was all about and there were four Syrian families working there together, cooking Syrian food. There was a big line of customers because the smells, flavors, and tastes of their food were outstanding. I remember these families asking me what I wanted to eat and I said, although I really wanted to taste their food, I wanted to talk to them first. I would eat their food later. They were so surprised that I wanted to speak with them.
   I find the human story to be most compelling and then the food comes after. Here were four families, which included a doctor, a lawyer, an accountant, a teacher, and they all had horrific refugee stories. They had suffered through really traumatic experiences and it was heartbreaking to hear their tales, but it wound up becoming a love story. These were the lucky ones who were able to get their papers in Germany and start their lives again. The doctor someday will hope to practice medicine again and the lawyer will one day hope to practice law. The accountant had already started with accounting work and the teacher was teaching Syrian children in the community. They had suffered from a lot of anger and hate directed at them because they were immigrants from another country.
   You find all sorts of stories in food halls. The world is not made up of fried chicken, fast cars, nice watches, and iPhones. The world is made up of people and I find people extremely compelling.

TG: You are the ultimate foodie, a renowned celebrity chef. You are an accomplished author. You have a wealth of top-notch television shows and you’ve won an Emmy. You teach, you produce and direct, and you’ve won four coveted James Beard awards. You are also a philanthropist and you make it a priority to be there for those who need your help. Which of these most defines you? In my opinion, it’s philanthropy.
AZ: I would agree with you. Philanthropy is the thing that occupies me and my time the most. The stuff that really interests me are the nonprofits and the boards I sit on and the development work that I’m doing here in Minnesota, in my own communities to try to heal and repair damage that has been done. This is what I hope will be the longer lasting legacy of mine.

TG: How do you balance your busy and rewarding career and your personal life? You’re a guiding light for the Independent Restaurant Coalition, diligently striving to save restaurants affected by COVID-19. You are also an inspiration to students with extreme challenges. You’ve given them an opportunity through your Andrew Zimmern’s Second Chances Scholarships and you scored a huge success with the International Rescue Committee. How do you balance it all?
AZ: I don’t; I wish I could. I get up every day and I keep going until nighttime. There’s so much need and so much to do. I don’t know any other way to approach it, so I dive into the deep end of the pool and get busy.
   There were 20 or 30 of us who got together in the beginning of March 2020 and we knew there was going to be a big problem for the independent restaurants and bars and the millions of people employed in this industry who would be affected by COVID-19. We decided to do something and we founded the IRC (Independent Restaurant Coalition) and several of us on the leadership committee sent a group text and as the SBA dollars started flowing, we were sort of collectively crying together. It was an incredible achievement. In over a year and a month, we went from being nothing to delivering $28 billion. We were finally able to deliver something to the people who needed it the most.
   You asked about the Second Chances Scholarships. I have one at the CIA, [Culinary Institute of America] and one at the James Beard Foundation. I was given so many second chances in my life and if I hadn’t been given these chances, I would have died a long time ago.

TG: What shows are on the horizon including your Family Dinner, which can be seen on Chip & Joanna Gaines’ Magnolia Network?
AZ: That’s the newest one, [Family Dinner with Andrew Zimmern] on Discovery+ and on the Magnolia App and the Magnolia Network, which takes over DIY, which happens in January 2022.  We have a bunch of other really cool shows in the works which I’m very excited about.

TG: You’ve eaten, written about, and developed television shows in almost 200 countries. Is there one item America’s most famous foodie never leaves home without when you are packing to hit the road?
AZ: Yes, crushed dried red chilies. I like spicy food and I find myself ordering room service at a hotel at 10 p.m. and the one thing they usually send up is a tiny bottle of tabasco. I always like to have dried red chilies for the bowl of pasta I order from room service.

TG: Is there one country you haven’t visited that’s on Andrew Zimmern’s bucket list? Do you have a favorite destination?
AZ: Shockingly I still haven’t been to the Czech Republic. If I go to Paraguay, I can cross all of South America off my list.

TG: Do you have a favorite destination, some place you really love?
AZ: Yes, southern and southwestern Africa. I find it a magical place. I find the indigenous people there to be kind and spiritually connected to their world and that is very special to me. This is real traveling and it takes forever to get into some the tribal communities there. 

TG: Thank you for enlightening and enriching our lives through all of your endeavors. 
For more information or to donate to Andrew Zimmern’s wealth of worthwhile (delight enriching) causes, please log onto https://andrewzimmern.com. 

The post Andrew Zimmern: Making the World a Better Place — One Dish at a Time appeared first on Travelgirl.