More than 40 years after her first album, Judy Collins is still a draw.
Collins, 64, performs Saturday at the Strom Auditorium at Camden Hills Regional High School in Rockport. Bay Chamber Concerts is presenting the concert, which is sold out and has a waiting list numbering 100.
Clearly, not many have forgotten Collins, whose biggest hits came in the 1960s, and who was immortalized in the Crosby, Stills and Nash song, “Suite: Judy Blue Eyes.”
In a telephone interview from her cell phone, as Collins was getting ready to fly to Boston from New York City, the singer attributed her continued success to “an awful lot of good luck.”
But she also acknowledges the importance of moving forward.
“I keep working and creating, writing songs,” she reflected Thursday.
After decades with Elektra Records – company founder Jac Holzman signed Collins after hearing her perform in Greenwich Village in 1961 – she has formed her own company, Wildflower Records. The company donates a portion of profits to charities and nonprofit organizations.
Collins says having her own company has enhanced her ongoing connection with listeners.
“I think it’s made a lot of difference,” Collins said. “I have a lot more control of what I’m doing.”
She does about 80 shows a year, though she could do more.
“Dylan does 100 shows a year,” she said, but “I just really feel it’s important to have a life.” Collins likes to have time to spend with her husband and her friends in New York, as well as make the occasional trip to Colorado, where she has roots.
As fine as her voice is – think of a violin played in its lower registers, almost imperceptibly, but expressively behind the beat – what sets Collins apart is her skills as an interpreter. In 1967, she had a top-10 hit with “Both Sides Now.” Though Joni Mitchell wrote the song, Collins made it her own, as she did with Ian Tyson’s “Someday Soon.”
While many of her song selections in the early years were consistent with her folk revival peers, Collins had a knack for finding new songwriters and songs from unexpected sources. She was the first to record Leonard Cohen’s music, scoring a hit with “Susanne.” “Send In The Clowns” by Stephen Sondheim, is perhaps her best-known recording.
“I love to think about how to do songs the right way,” Collins said.
From the crop of younger folk singers, she likes Lucy Kaplansky and John Gorka.
“And I still love Billy Joel,” she said. “He can do no wrong as far as I’m concerned.”
Collins has been absorbing Annie Lennox’s new record – another singer she admires.
But she is not resting on her laurels.
“I’m working on a new album which will probably come out in May of 2004,” she said.
A CD and DVD are also being released documenting what has become an annual event, her Wildflower Festival, featuring fellow-folkies Arlo Guthrie, Tom Rush and Eric Andersen.
She also tours with some of her folk contemporaries, “the three Toms – Tom Rush, Tom Paxton and Tom Chapin,” as well as Roger McGuinn and Richie Havens.
A Christmas special, taped for the A&E network in 1998, will also be released on DVD soon.
Collins remains passionate about politics, she said. Recalling her testimony at the so-called Chicago 7 trial, at which she insisted on singing “Where Have All The Flowers Gone,” Collins said the words of the anti-war song still ring true today.
Joining her onstage will be her longtime musical director Russ Walden, who sings and plays several instruments.
Tom Groening can be reached at groening@midcoast.com.
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