Longtime folksinger Lucy Kaplansky to perform
She’ll be at The Kate Dec. 1 playing classics, supporting new album
Lucy Kaplansky’s doing it her way. Other than some hesitation about career plans during her college and grad school years, she’s been part of the national folk scene since the late 1970s.
“I started playing in 1977 when I was too young to be in some of the clubs I was playing,” Kaplansky says. That was in Chicago, where she grew up. By the time she was 18, she was living in New York, which she still calls home. She largely quit music for nearly a decade when she was in her 20s and early 30s, then returned to it full-time when she was 34. Around that time, she says, “the whole folk scene exploded. It broadened and deepened.” That’s when she started recording.
Kaplansky recently released her 10th solo album, “Last Days of Summer.” The album captures Kaplansky’s low-key style and gorgeous singing voice. The production is full and crisp, and the lyrics, which often offer detailed stories and rich characters, as in “Mary’s Room,” come across clearly. Her sense of humor and her sense of pathos both shine through in “Ford Econoline.” She also continues to find classy songs to cover. Kaplansky’s 2007 cover of Roxy Music’s “More Than This” has earned over 12 million streams on Spotify. On the new album, she does a sprightly folk cover of Nancy Sinatra’s “These Boots Are Made for Walkin’,” though you won’t find it on Spotify.
That’s because these days Kaplansky acts as her own manager and publicist. She has been rethinking how to maneuver all the recent changes in how the music industry operates. When preparing to market the “Last Days of Summer” album, “I had a revelation that, if it’s true that nobody is buying CDS because you can hear everything on streaming services, then I just shouldn’t put the album on the streaming services.”
“Last Days of Summer” is available only from Kaplansky’s website, lucykaplansky.com, or
Lucy Kaplansky performs Dec. 1 at 7:30 p.m. at the Katharine Hepburn Cultural Arts Center, 300 Main St., Old Saybrook. $36. katharinehepburntheater.org.
at her live shows.
“It worked out really well, she says, “I’m selling this record completely on my own. It’s only available through me. I’m doing everything else, too. I decided I’m a better advocate for myself than other people would be.”
The album, she says, “was written and recorded during the worst parts of COVID. I was home almost two years, so I wrote songs.” The title song marks a recent development in her life: her daughter going to college and the subsequent feelings of longing and wistfulness. The album does not have an overall theme, but
“family relationships and goodbyes are a big one.”
Kaplansky is playing one of her favorite Connecticut venues, the Katharine Hepburn Cultural Arts Center in Old Saybrook, on Dec. 1, with Brooklyn-based singer-songwriter Jesse Ruben opening the 7:30 p.m. show.
With several decades of recordings and fans who know them all, Kaplansky says she’s prepared to “mix it up every night.” Currently, she’s playing some things
from the new record and a lot from the old records. “I also take requests. People have great ideas about what song might fit next.” Songs that invariably make it into the set are “Ten Year Night” from 1999’s album of the same name and the math geek anthem, “The Song About Pi.”
“The other night, somebody asked me to play something I’d never played before,” Kaplansky recalls. She was able to do it. “Somebody else said ‘I’ve never someone as generous as you are with requests.’ ”
Kaplansky is known for her many collaborations with other folk musicians, from
Cheryl Wheeler to Richard Shindell to John Gorka and Eliza Gilkyson. Some of those artists have also played on some of her solo albums.
“I love collaborating,” she says. “I love playing with a band. But a band is expensive.”
She likes the convenience of heading out from her New York home for solo shows on weekends — especially to Connecticut, from which she can usually drive home afterward. She also loves the places she’s played here. “The Kate is a beautiful venue. Fairfield Theatre Company is another favorite place. I have a good following
in Connecticut.” The Kate was actually the last place Kaplansky played before the COVID pandemic closed most of the theaters on March 11, 2020.
“Being able to do this now is incredibly satisfying,” Kaplansky says. “I realize how lucky I am. When I first started, there were radio stations that would give a break to unsigned or independent artists. Those stations don’t exist anymore. Now I don’t know how a new artist could get their start.”