Ether Ashe Indefatigable Roots Life in New Mexico The Tao of Touring Folk power Writing down the bones To play or not to play

If we are judged by the company we keep, the New Mexico Tech Performing Arts Series has a stellar reputation.

Despite the relatively small budget of the department and the small size of Socorro — well off the beaten path of most touring musicians — the series, under the clear guidance of director Ronna Kalish, somehow manages to reel in impressive music.

Eliza Gilkyson, who played to a packed house at Macey Center on Friday, Nov. 20, is just one example of the kind of class and talent the Performing Arts Series affords to its audiences on a regular basis.

Gilkyson has had a long, impressive career, which includes 14 albums, a Grammy nomination and induction into the Austin Music Hall of Fame.

Gilkyson comes from a family that has a musical pedigree of almost mythical depth and influence. Her father, Terry, was a prolific songwriter, who penned several hits and also worked for the Walt Disney Company during it's golden years. Her brother, Tony, is a smoking-hot guitarist, who plays with the legendary Los Angeles punk band "X," and her sister is an executive for Warner Bros. Records.

Gilkyson's life has obviously been heavily influenced by music from the beginning, and she talked openly about her life and career in a phone interview with El Defensor Chieftain, the day after her performance in Socorro.

When asked what was it like growing up in such an amazing musical family Gilkyson said, "We spoke a common language, we were all on the same page. It's a really tight family, and when we got older, in our 40s, we realized how special it was."

Gilkyson grew up in Los Angeles, where her father made a living writing and performing music; but she eventually moved to Sante Fe in the late 1960s. The transition was an easy one, since she spent a lot of time there during family vacations.

"I had an aunt who lived in Sante Fe, who actually started the first music store there — House of Music," she said.

Although Gilkyson has worked consistently within the folk genre most of her life, she took a short side trip into new age music while she lived in Sante Fe. She wrote an experimental album triggered by a book she read on Jungian archetypes and got branded, erroneously, as a new age artist for some time.

It was a label that damaged her career for a while.

"I spent literally 15 years trying to erase that image," she said.

Gilkyson became disillusioned with the new age movement, and realized that a more pragmatic approach to living was necessary.

"It was all evasion of reality," she said. "It's a joke to act like we can transcend all our troubles by meditation."

Gilkyson is no political slouch, and many would consider her a musical activist. But she advocates hard work and action rather that idealism.

"We are on Earth right now, we have bodies," she said. "People have to be active and serve each other here."

Gilkyson still has a lot of friends in New Mexico, and even though it was her first time playing in Socorro in nearly 40 years, she knows people locally.

Musician Mariam Funke produced one of her albums several years ago, and she also knows musician, luthier and recent Austin transplant Bill Giebitz.

Gilkyson sounds a bit sad when talking about New Mexico, her attachment to the state still palpable.

"Ahh, if I could still live here part of the year, I would," she said.

Gilkyson's relocation to Austin was a career move, and was also meant to give her children more opportunities, a city upbringing. She has nothing but accolades for the super-charged music city,

"It's not competitive," she said. "There's no music industry.

"It's more focused on the creativity and the camaraderie, and there are so many places to play."

Austin is also centrally located, making it easier to catch a flight to either coast for concerts.

The live music scene and enthusiastic fan base in Austin is known worldwide. Watching live music is a nightlife mainstay there.

"In New Mexico, we had such a hard time getting fans to come out," she said, referring to her younger days.

Gilkyson plays in a lot of different venues, but was especially impressed with the Macey Center. She stressed how fortunate Socorro is to have such a place, and how locals should support the programs offered there, even during tough economic times.

"Art centers like yours really suffer when the economy is bad," she said. "I want to mention again how important these places are.

"All you have to do is buy a ticket and go."

Touring has always been a mainstay of the music business, but Gilkyson says it is more vital than ever for making it as a musician.

"Everybody is out touring now, because the record companies are not selling records like they used to," she said. Sales made on music and merchandise during and after shows is vital to success these days.

Sales for internet downloads are growing, but Gilkyson still does well selling CDs at shows, a format which seems to be preferred by folk music fans.

Folk music has had a strong following, lasting well over 40 years, when other forms of music have waxed and waned.

Gilkyson has her own theories about why the folk genre has lasted so long.

"It may be because it didn't morph into what was required of it," she said. "Community, that's what it focused on.

"It's not the coolest thing, and I never felt like I was the coolest ... I'm just a community oriented, ex-hippy,"

Gilkyson's grass-roots political sensibility, along with her location in the multi-layered, largely anti-establishment Austin scene has allowed her to slowly cultivate her music, without being associated with the soul-selling marketing frenzy of Nashville.

Gilkyson's attempts to remain true to her voice have paid off: many reviewers have called her 2008 album "Beautiful World," her best yet.

When asked how her craft has evolved over the many years she has been an active song writer, she relates a tale of seasoned discipline, built on the back of sullen youth.

"I don't write as many as I used to," she said. But her writing process has become more proficient and fecund.

"I have sort of a romantic phase with the song, and will not let it go until it's just right."

This phase lasts about two weeks, and can mean waking up in the middle of the night to hone lyrics, or fiddle with harmonies.

"Once I get the creativity part - sort a mystical part — then I go over it until it's done."

"I have sort of a terrier-like tenacity with it. It becomes like a Rubik's Cube, or a mathematics equation by the end."

The process is much different from the one she experienced when she was younger, when her life and work were more emotionally driven and chaotic.

"I don't have an angst-driven life anymore," she said. "Since I'm happy there's less pressure.

"My joy is based on a hard-won road through fields of sorrow."

When asked if she ever gets fed up with the music business, or desires to take an extended break she said, "I think it's a good idea to take an inventory.

"A few times I played a silly game with myself, saying 'I'm going to quit,'" because she didn't have the fame or recognition she thought she deserved.

Gilkyson has since laughed off such notions; but she can still feel time breathing down her neck.

"I don't know how long I'm going to be able to tour," she said, wondering if she may have to cut back on concert dates in a few years.

Until such time, she keeps plugging away, traveling, playing live and recording.

After a brief holiday reprieve in Austin, she will head back to the road in January, gearing up for a summer tour in Europe.

Gilkyson's most recent recording session was with Grammy-nominated choral group Conspirare.

The collaborative album "Lay me Low," which is the 2008 recording of a live Christmas concert, is available online: http://conspirare.org/?p=1861.