By Mark E. Waterbury

MM: What instigated your career as a musician?

MS: I wanted to sing since I was a kid but I was too shy. When I was ten, I used to go up to a studio just down the street to sing because I was too shy to sing in the house. My dad said if I wanted to take singing lessons I would have to pay for them myself, so I got this job as a waitress at a coffee shop when I was fourteen to pay for them. The only teacher around at the time was an opera teacher so I had to learn that, which was actually very good training. I also had a great music teacher in high school who was very inspiring. When I finished high school my parents did not want to send me to college and said I would have to educate myself, so I moved to New York City because the best teachers in the world are there. I was there when I was fifteen years old and spent three months there staying at the Martha Washington Hotel. I used to walk the city, and at night I would look out the window and just watch what was happening. Just before I left, I called a friend of my brother's and went over to his house for dinner. He was working at a local hospital, and there was a young guy staying on his couch at the time who was studying acting that ended up being Dustin Hoffman. We drove around the city all night long on his motor scooter and just saw everything and had a wonderful time. It was the beginning of a wonderful friendship. When I moved there after high school Dustin called me up and had a place for me to live with four other gals. All these girls were in show business and I had never been in show business in my life. Suddenly I was thrown into this world of people doing (show business) and they were wonderful and started showing me things. Dustin was directing his first play and there was a part for someone to sing a song in it. I can't tell you how shy I was, but Dustin was a very clever director and he finally convinced me that the character was just like me and I just had to be myself. So I started it and began to see what show business was all about. I was in front of all these people singing and I found I really enjoyed it.

MM: Was it your acting career that delayed your music career?

MS: There was this time where I had given up on music, and had family responsibilities and fears and doubts. I had two sick parents for about fifteen years along with my fears and doubts about singing myself, and other obligations I had in Hollywood so I quit for a long time. Then not too long ago I started the process of getting out and singing in clubs. You shouldn't give up on your dreams, you may have delays in your life but eventually if you put yourself out there, things will fall into place. The band members came to me when I was out singing so that is how that happened.

MM: How did you overcome your fears and doubts about performing?

MS: I got over it by getting out of my own way. Everyone has something else that no one else has, their own little gift. I don't really see life as a competition because there is only one you and your expression is important and valuable. The thing is to learn to value yourself first and then do something about it. The hardest thing sometimes is just to overcome yourself. When I got the movie "One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest", I had doubts at the time. I had a big time agent and my career was taking off. I played the agent a record I had made in New York and he told me not to play that for anybody, and since he was a big shot, I thought it was the end of my music career. I listened to that recording again years later and I though to myself, ' this was pretty darn good'. But when I was doing "Cuckoo's Nest" a friend taught me how to meditate. Thathelped me a lot, having that twenty minutes or so of silence, and it helped me to learn to appreciate myself more. As I got more of an appreciation for myself, my fears started abating. I felt good about what I was doing and did not get all stressed out about it. I had always been afraid of anything I did, but you have to think, 'OK, I'm afraid, now I have to go do it anyway'.

MM: So how did your first recording "Pearl Street Garage #1" come about?

MS: About the time that I started to perform out again, my nephew moved here. He had just graduated from Berklee School of Music. We were helping his grandmother clean out her garage when we found all of this old music. We brought it over to my garage which was on Pearl Street, and we discovered all of these gems and amazing songs. I really just felt that they deserved to be done and I wanted to sing them. I got the band members who I knew through my shows involved throughout the process as well. After we were done recording, I got stopped in the process because I ran out of money. The soundman I had been working with asked me what happened to the album and I said I ran out of money to finish it. He said he would lend me the money if I would pay him back by selling CDs. So I finished it, but I didn't have the money to print the CDs. Another person who had heard me sing said he would help me with that if I paid him back out of my CD sales.

MM: What did you do when "Pearl Street Garage #1" was released to try to get its name out?

MS: I was primarily selling CDs where I was performing. I would really push them and the fans would buy them, and my family and their friends would buy them. Then I had a friend that told me about Sheheshe radio promotion and some other radio companies. The radio company then led to me bringing in a publicist as well. I needed money for these entities and then someone else came along who liked my music and wanted to help out with that. I want to inspire people that if they just start doing what they want to do and it is part of their life and something they like to do, I can tell you from personal experience that helpers come along and it can happen. Even more important then the CD itself is the process of creating something and going for your desire. And I have paid both the soundman and the other investor back pretty much everything they loaned me to complete the CD.

MM: What are your plans for your next release?

MS: When we recorded "Pearl Street", I recorded about twenty-one songs so we have another album worth of material already done. When I die if I haven't put six or seven more CDs out, I am not going to be happy, because there are songs that I really want so sing, and there is a composer that has written some really beautiful songs for me. There are all these songs so the next one will probably be "Pearl Street Garage #2" and will be done partially with some new band members. I'm also looking for a running part on a TV series, and if I get that, all these concerts should come much more easily. I have to focus on that and I don't really know what's coming, so I always keep singing and always keep thinking.