Interview: Michael Feinstein Talks Working With Dolly Parton, Brad Paisley & More on GERSHWIN COUNTRY

Michael Feinstein is one of the leading entertainers in the world today. He has released more than 30 studio and live albums, earned five GRAMMY nominations and two Emmy nominations, and has performed everywhere from The White House, to Buckingham Palace, to Carnegie Hall, and more. Feinstein is also the founder of the Great American Songbook Foundation, and is the preeminent expert on George and Ira Gershwin, working to preserve and promote their extraordinary work and legacy.

Feinstein's latest release, Gershwin Country, is an album of brand-new duets reimagining the classic songs of George and Ira Gershwin through the contemporary lens of country music. Executive produced by Liza Minnelli, the album features some of the biggest names in country music, including Dolly Parton, Alison Krauss, Brad Paisley Rosanne Cash, and more!

Stream, download or buy Gershwin Country today.

BroadwayWorld spoke with Michael Feinstein about the creation of the album, the staying power of the Gershwins' music, and much more.

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You are the preeminent expert on George and Ira Gershwin, and you have released many albums centered on their music. How did the idea come to you to release a country album of the Gershwin's music?

It started as a morning reverie when I was lying in bed and watching the thoughts drift through my mind, sort of dissociative ideas that traverse my brain, and the idea of Gershwin Country popped into my head. And unlike all the other thoughts that come and go, that one seemed like there was something to it, and it stayed in my mind throughout the day. I started thinking about what the possibilities could be if that were a project that I pursued. It just seemed intriguing to me. That subconscious planting of that idea probably came from Maya Angelou, who I knew very well and was staying with a few years earlier at her home in Winston-Salem. She loved country music and played a lot of country music while I was staying there, and talked about it. And I even asked her if she would be interested in producing a country album with me, and she said yes. But then that never happened, she passed away and that was that.

But for some reason the idea came back in connection with the Gershwins, and the more I thought about it, the more it started to make sense because of the common roots of country music and Gershwin, in the sense that they are both part of a certain era of Americana, if you will, and a certain period of time that has laid the bedrock for popular music and everything that followed after it. And so, I was also thinking about the idea, or the fact, really, that the best singers of lyrics, and storytellers, come from Nashville, in that genre. And there are such great voices in the country field. So, it was a combination of all of those elements that made it seem like a possibility.

And how did you decide what artists you wanted to collaborate with on this album?

That was not easy, and my friend Liza Minnelli helped a great deal as Executive Producer. Because she grew up with the Gershwin music, and her father was best friends with both Gershwins, and her mother, of course, starred in the movie Girl Crazy, and she was named Liza after the Gershwin song. And so, she helped. And my producer, Kyle Lehning, is a true master of recording arts, and also of country music. And he had the avenues to approach a lot of people. So we went through many different names. And I was very careful in curating a song for a particular voice or personality, and would submit it to them. And in almost all the cases they liked the song that I suggested. And that was wonderful.

With Alison Krauss, who was one of the first people I approached, I suggested Someone to Watch Over Me because I could literally hear her voice in my head singing that song. And she wanted to hear other possibilities. So, I made demos singing and playing a bunch of other things in different styles, trying to approximate a country style, and sent those to her. And eventually she returned to the first choice, Someone to Watch Over Me.

What was the process of arranging these classic songs to make them into country interpretations? Was it an easy process for you? Was it a collaborative one?

It was not easy, because I knew it had to be a perfect combination of all the different elements to make it work. And the reason I was able to realize it is because of Kyle. He was masterful in discussing the different treatments of the song. So, there was the fundamental treatment of the piece. Take, I've Got a Crush on You. I've Got a Crush on You is a song that is usually sung as a slow ballad. It was originally written as a fast-paced one-step for a Broadway show called Treasure Girl, and it was sung and danced by Clifton Webb and Mary Hay. So, there are infinite possibilities with any song, really. And so we came up with the idea of doing it sort of medium tempo with a kind of rhythmic accompaniment, where the phrases could be sung elongated underneath the rhythmic accompaniment. Just to give you an idea of the amount of thought and craft that went into each track.

The other part that's difficult in creating a duet recording, is making sure the song lends itself to be divided up and sung by two people. I've Got a Crush on You was originally a duet in 1928. And then, to find a key that works, because when a man and a woman are singing together, usually they are about four or five steps away from each other on the scale. And so, it was to put together vocal routines and vocal arrangements that would accommodate both voices so we were singing in the same key. Often I'll hear a lazy duet album where the guy sings 8 bars in his key and the woman sings 8 bars in her key, then he goes back to his key, then her key. And it's like, why are they even doing this? They're not even singing in the same key! And I realized it seems to be a cynical attempt to put to artists together to sell more recordings. And this is the polar opposite of that. This was all fueled by the artistic vision, not knowing if it would appeal to anybody, but it just made sense to me.

And you can tell in the recordings how much care and time was put into it. So, it does make a difference.

Well, thank you. The musicians were spectacular, and a wonderful, talented singer named Tania Hanceroff helped with a lot of the vocal routines, and then Ryan Sutton and Viktor Krauss did the layouts for some of the arrangements, and then we would tweak everything in the studio where we would do things extemporaneously, like, "Let's extend 8 bars here," or "Let's go up half a step," or "Let's put a tag on at the end of this," or "Let's cut down the verse of Someone to Watch over me, where Alison and I made a decision not to sing the verse of the whole song, which might have irritated Ira Gershwin, but it made sense for that treatment. So, it was really on a case-by-case basis. And it felt like climbing a mountain and the beginning of it [laughs].

How did you record this album? Were you actually in the studio with each of these artists? What was the process like?

Most of the tracks were done face to face but not all of them. I flew to Houston to record with Lyle Lovett. I recorded what we call the bonus track, Embraceable You with Liza Minelli in Los Angeles, but the rest were recorded in Nashville. And I was face to face with Alison, and Ronnie Milsap, and with Amy Grant. Some of them were virtual. Dolly wanted to live with the track and my vocal, and I had suggested what she might sing for a while, and then she took it, and she did a totally different thing with it, which was fantastic, and then we would go back and forth. And then Brad Paisley, Brad did his vocal separate, but then we did our interplay with dialogue back and forth, because I wanted it to be like an old Bob Hope, Bing Crosby road musical, that's what I wanted it to feel like! So those two were not done in person, but to me, they sound more in person than some of the other tracks [laughs].

That's so interesting! What would you say is your overall takeaway from recording this album? Did doing these interpretations of these songs teach you anything about the Gershwins' music that you hadn't known before? Or maybe you learned something about yourself during this process?

What I learned about the songs- and perhaps I already knew this, but it brough it home in a different way- is that the songs have universal appeal. I expect that many of the people who listen to the recording may not know anything about the Gershwins or may not have heard the songs before, but they stand up on their own as songs. Lee Ann Womack did not know the song Soon because it's an obscure Gershwin song, relatively speaking, and she sang her heart out on it with that gorgeous, dynamic, torch talent with which she is imbued. And so, it taught me that the songs have a life of their own, and they have a certain fundamental appeal that transcends the time in which they were written.

As far as what I've learned personally, it's always an education when collaborating with another artist. And I learned tremendously putting the tracks together with the various extraordinary musicians, who were all more talented than I was when it came to making music, and I learned a lot about the recording process. Because normally when I record, I sing it with a live accompaniment, whether it be a big band, or a trio, or a combo, or a symphony, and I make records very quickly because I can, because I'm from the old school of doing it live. This was a process where we would do a track and then we would overdub, we would add some mandolin, we would add a violin, we would add this or add that. So, it was fun playing in the toolbox of technology for musical enrichment. And so, that was a tremendous joy.

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Gershwin Country tracklist (CD/Digital):

1. Love Is Here To Stay featuring Dolly Parton
2. I've Got A Crush On You featuring Rosanne Cash
3. Someone To Watch Over Me featuring Alison Krauss
4. I Got Rhythm featuring Brad Paisley
5. They Can't Take That Away From Me featuring Amy Grant
6. Clap Yo' Hands featuring Lyle Lovett
7. How Long Has This Been Going On? featuring Mandy Barnett
8. Fascinating Rhythm featuring The Time Jumpers with Vince Gill
9. Soon featuring Lee Ann Womack
10. Oh, Lady Be Good! featuring Ronnie Milsap
11. Embraceable You featuring Liza Minnelli