Suzanne Vega plays RCC Friday
Suzanne Vega says her followers fall into several circles.
Many people only know her from the ’80s, from her songs “Luka” and “Tom’s Diner,” the song that begins:
“I am sitting/
In the morning/
At the diner/
On the corner.”
Other people know her music a little deeper, songs like “The Queen and the Soldier” and “Gypsy.”
Then, says Vega: “There are people who know the whole back catalog, they know every single song, and they come to all the shows and they sing along. They’re also my friend on Facebook and they read all the tweets. That’s a more select circle.”
Members of all circles, whether “Luka” or “Gypsy” or full-fledged Vegan, will be able to catch Vega live on Friday, when ArtsRock brings her to Rockland Community College for an 8 p.m. concert.
“I’m a Facebook fan and I try to post something once or twice a day,” she says. “I tweet once every few days.”
“I really enjoy Facebook,” she says. “I read the posts and I’ve gotten to know new people and see where they’re from, and they come to my concerts. It’s a really cool medium.”
Might it someday find its way into a Suzanne Vega song?
“Oh, I hope not,” she says with an easy laugh. “Because then it’ll move on and I’ll have to sing about some new medium.”
She adds, however, that stringing together140-character tweets might make for an interesting song.
“If you write a bunch of them, then you’ve got a whole bunch of narrative verses. It could be perfect.”
An avid reader of biographies and classic literature, Vega lately has been reading the works of the recently deceased former Czech President Vaclav Havel, including “To the Castle and Back,” which includes memos from presidency and “Letters to Olga,” comprising rather formal letters Havel wrote to his wife from jail. The letters were written in a form of code and “take a little patience, but it’s fascinating.” As for what she’ll play on Friday — when she’ll be joined on stage by her musical director Jerry Leonard — Vega says it will be a mix of old and new, including songs from “Suzanne Vega: Close-Up Vol. 3 — States of Being,” the November release in a four-part retrospective of her catalog.
Also on that CD is a new song from Vega’s play “Carson McCullers Talks About Love,” which she wrote with Duncan Sheik. It ran at Rattlestick Theater in New York last May — with Vega playing McCullers, the writer who had a home in Nyack and is buried there — and will open in the fall in San Francisco, without her. Vega says she plans to bring it back to New York one day, adding that she learned much from the process.
“I learned it takes a while and that doing a musical is different from doing a regular play,” she says. “It was fascinating. I learned that learning the script is not the same as writing the script. I had to learn to run my lines just like any actor would have to.”
She also learned to curse the playwright at times.
“I did. I was like ‘Whose brilliant idea is this? Oh, mine,” she says with a laugh.
She doesn’t remember if she has played in Rockland before, but there’s an easy way to find out.
“I ask the audience,” she says. “And if I have, they’ll say ‘Yes!’ and they’ll know the date.”
Suzanne Vega in Concert
When: 8 p.m. Friday.
Where: Rockland Community College, Cultural Arts Theater, 145 College Road, Ramapo.
Tickets: $35-$45.
Call: 866-811-4111
Next at ArtsRock: Elliott Forrest hosts a wide-ranging discussion with WNYC radio personalities Brian Lehrer, Brooke Gladstone and John Hockenberry at Tappan Zee High School on March 31. They’ll talk about their lives in radio, journalism, politics, and the election. Part of the proceeds will benefit arts programs at Tappan Zee.
Suzanne Vega says her followers fall into several circles.
Many people only know her from the ’80s, from her songs “Luka” and “Tom’s Diner,” the song that begins:
“I am sitting/
In the morning/
At the diner/
On the corner.”
Other people know her music a little deeper, songs like “The Queen and the Soldier” and “Gypsy.”
Then, says Vega: “There are people who know the whole back catalog, they know every single song, and they come to all the shows and they sing along. They’re also my friend on Facebook and they read all the tweets. That’s a more select circle.”
Members of all circles, whether “Luka” or “Gypsy” or full-fledged Vegan, will be able to catch Vega live on Friday, when ArtsRock brings her to Rockland Community College for an 8 p.m. concert.
“I’m a Facebook fan and I try to post something once or twice a day,” she says. “I tweet once every few days.”
“I really enjoy Facebook,” she says. “I read the posts and I’ve gotten to know new people and see where they’re from, and they come to my concerts. It’s a really cool medium.”
Might it someday find its way into a Suzanne Vega song?
“Oh, I hope not,” she says with an easy laugh. “Because then it’ll move on and I’ll have to sing about some new medium.”
She adds, however, that stringing together140-character tweets might make for an interesting song.
“If you write a bunch of them, then you’ve got a whole bunch of narrative verses. It could be perfect.”
An avid reader of biographies and classic literature, Vega lately has been reading the works of the recently deceased former Czech President Vaclav Havel, including “To the Castle and Back,” which includes memos from presidency and “Letters to Olga,” comprising rather formal letters Havel wrote to his wife from jail. The letters were written in a form of code and “take a little patience, but it’s fascinating.” As for what she’ll play on Friday — when she’ll be joined on stage by her musical director Jerry Leonard — Vega says it will be a mix of old and new, including songs from “Suzanne Vega: Close-Up Vol. 3 — States of Being,” the November release in a four-part retrospective of her catalog.
Also on that CD is a new song from Vega’s play “Carson McCullers Talks About Love,” which she wrote with Duncan Sheik. It ran at Rattlestick Theater in New York last May — with Vega playing McCullers, the writer who had a home in Nyack and is buried there — and will open in the fall in San Francisco, without her. Vega says she plans to bring it back to New York one day, adding that she learned much from the process.
“I learned it takes a while and that doing a musical is different from doing a regular play,” she says. “It was fascinating. I learned that learning the script is not the same as writing the script. I had to learn to run my lines just like any actor would have to.”
She also learned to curse the playwright at times.
“I did. I was like ‘Whose brilliant idea is this? Oh, mine,” she says with a laugh.
She doesn’t remember if she has played in Rockland before, but there’s an easy way to find out.
“I ask the audience,” she says. “And if I have, they’ll say ‘Yes!’ and they’ll know the date.”
Suzanne Vega in Concert
When: 8 p.m. Friday.
Where: Rockland Community College, Cultural Arts Theater, 145 College Road, Ramapo.
Tickets: $35-$45.
Call: 866-811-4111
Next at ArtsRock: Elliott Forrest hosts a wide-ranging discussion with WNYC radio personalities Brian Lehrer, Brooke Gladstone and John Hockenberry at Tappan Zee High School on March 31. They’ll talk about their lives in radio, journalism, politics, and the election. Part of the proceeds will benefit arts programs at Tappan Zee.
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