Mandy Barnett

QUEEN OF CROSSVILLE

On Her Latest Album, Mandy Barnett Sings the Best of the Nashville Songbook

BY LEE VALENTINE SMITH

LATE LAST MONTH, DYNAMIC vocalist-actress and Crossville, Tennessee native Mandy Barnett was honored in her hometown by the Tennessee Department of Tourist Development. On her birthday, the program unveiled a special “Tennessee Music Pathways” marker in the city’s downtown square. Family and local officials were on hand to celebrate the occasion. The event offered a bit of small-town nostalgia tinged with the reality of today. With social distancing in mind, she blew out the candles on her birthday cake with a handheld fan, followed by an appropriately safe performance from the nearby Palace Theatre. The commemoration highlights a busy year for the talented performer who began her singing career before she entered elementary school. From her well-received early performances, she rose in popularity to major-label contracts, regular guest appearances at the Grand Ole Opry and the starring role in “Always…Patsy Cline” at the Ryman Auditorium. Recently she’s toured the world with a series of lush Nashville Songbook celebrations. The latest edition to her catalog of vibrant recordings is her first edition of familiar Music City classics. The diverse album includes timeless takes on “The End of the World” and a definitive version of Kris Kristofferson’s “Help Me Make It Through The Night.” INsite caught up with Barnett by phone from a noisy Nashville restaurant after a recent recording session.

How are you handling the pandemic? Obviously you’re getting out a bit. I’m starting to get used to it. I’m finally getting out a little but I pick and choose what I do and I’m still very careful. I have a bag with me that has Pine Sol, alcohol, paper towels and hand sanitizer. I swear this sanitizer smells just like moonshine! I’m not sure where it came from, but it smells a lot like liquor to me. I actually think you could drink it, I’m not joking. But I’m handling it like everyone, just trying to make the best of the bad situation.

Have you used the downtime to work on new projects? I cleaned the house manically for the first few months, then I started to get a little slack with it. And now I’m promoting an album during a pandemic. That was never the plan of course, but you do what you have to do, now more than ever. Lately I’ve been doing a few ukulele videos. You know how people are doing these videos from home? Well I’m used to singing with a whole band. But out of boredom, I started getting a little better on the uke, so I decided to record some of them and put them on my Facebook site. People really responded to them. I tried to do uplifting songs and I think it’s kinda made people feel a little better. I hope so, anyway. Especially in the beginning, it was such a scary time and nobody quite knew what was going on. As usual, music was a good way to feel a little better about things. It was funny, it made me realize how much people are starved for entertainment and music. So it seemed like a good time to release this record. Now I’m actually glad we did.

It’s good to see there’s a vinyl edition of it. Me too. I love to listen to vinyl and I’m glad to see it’s making a big comeback and all - but I also get into all the modern technology. I have a Bluetooth speaker and I’ll sit in my kitchen and listen to things on Bluetooth just like I used to sit in front of my humongous stereo with five different stacks of things and the big speakers and all. I do it the same way.

Do you enjoy the intimacy of doing those Facebook shows? Some people seem to embrace the chance to be “real” and at home while some people seem a bit wary to reveal too much of their private life. I do enjoy it. I’m at home but I’m not sitting in the bed or anything. I just do them from the kitchen. In a lot of ways that’s also revealing because I’m sitting in the chair I sit in when I do a lot of my work. But it’s where I’m comfortable and it definitely looks homey. I have some good lighting to make it as show-biz as I possibly can. But I don’t do it a lot. I don’t think I do it to the point where I’m making people sick of seeing me. It’s just enough to let people know I’m still here and I’m singing to them. If it gives them some hope or makes us all feel a little better then that’s what I wanted. I hope it does because it helps me, too.

The Songbook album and concept has been around long before the pandemic. Oh yes. I started working on the live show around 2015. I did three nights of Songbook shows with the Nashville Symphony to start it all off. So that’s really how it started, with the live symphonic show. I did several nights with different symphonies including in Belfast. I’ve done the show in a number of performing arts centers, but an album was always part of the plan.

The album format doesn’t include the whole live set, does it? No, the live show is around 90 minutes. The album is 13 songs and that makes it a little difficult as to what to include.

You did a good job of including a lot of material to highlight the best of the Nashville Songbook. But it wasn’t easy to decide, that’s for sure. We went from 1947 through the ‘70s, so there’s so many possibilities to include. In the live show, we had an overture and that included a lot of things we didn’t have time for in the set. But I believe the good thing about this concept is, it can always grow. When you look at the best of Nashville, that can be a whole series of shows or albums, just because there’s so many good things to pick from. So I’m sure we’ll do more. For the live show, I can change out the songs and for the album, there’s always a volume two or three. The Great American Songbook is just so big, we’ll have to keep going with it to include all the songs I love to do.

Of the current batch, which is your favorite track? I know it’s hard to pick just one. Yeah, it’s really hard to narrow it down to just one, but I think my favorite would have to be “I Can’t Help It (If I’m Still In Love With You).” I think it represents one of those moments in time that you can’t really recreate even if you had to try. I mean the recording. It was just very raw and very real, extremely authentic. It was a one-take performance and because of that, it’s truly honest.

These songs are familiar to music lovers and artists as well. Since you’ve been performing them for a few years now, do they ever trigger the initial feeling you had when you first heard them? They do sometimes. When you do them live, the audience can bring different things at different times. I’ve sung “Crazy,” for example, hundreds of times. But there are still times where it feels like I’m singing it for the first time. It can be a combination of what I’m feeling at the moment, how the band is playing and often how the audience reacts to it. A great audience can really bring a song to life. Even if it’s a song you’ve played hundreds of times. It can change from show to show or even song to song. It’s all about how it comes together in that particular moment.

That’s the beauty of a live performance. It is and that’s why I really enjoy singing for a really receptive audience. These days, I really miss it!

You’re obviously known for incredible interpretations of great songs, but is there ever a time when you go, ‘You know what, I think I’ll just write my own album?’ My own originals? Well, the thing about my songwriting is I enjoy dabbling in it. I’m certainly capable of writing a good song. But I don’t believe I could write an album full of great songs. It’s a craft, like any other type of art. But for me, I’ve just never really bought into the idea that every singer needs to write their own songs or their own albums. That’s probably the best way to end up with an album full of mediocre material with one really good single on it. I think I’ll just leave that job to the masters.

The Nashville Songbook is available from most music retailers or via mandybarnett.com. At press time, Barnett has only one live performance scheduled for 2020. A hometown holiday show is slated for on Thursday, December 3 at the Cumberland County Playhouse in Crossville, TN.