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- [00:00]
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Sam Briger
From WHYY in Philadelphia, this is FRESH AIR WEEKEND. I'm Sam Brigger. Today, Julian Brave Noisecat. He co directed an Oscar nominated documentary, personal and historical import. It's about the Canadian missionary boarding schools that indigenous children, including members of his family, were required to go to get assimilated. Many children were physically and sexually abused. While making the film and writing his new memoir, we Survived the Night Noise, Cat learned why minutes after his father was born, he was abandoned in a boarding school trash incinerator room. Also, Grammy winning Icelandic musician Levi plays guitar and sings some songs for us.
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Levi (musician)
All I did was wonder how your arms would be and it happened to me.
- [01:13]
Sam Briger
That's coming up on FRESH AIR Weekend.
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- [02:37]
Sam Briger
I'm Sam Brigger. Terry has our first interview today. Here she is.
- [02:41]
Terry Gross
Minutes after being born, Ed Archie Noisekat was thrown away, literally. The infant was discovered with the garbage ready to be burned at St. Joseph's Mission School for Indigenous Canadians. He was rescued from incineration by the night watchman. St. Joseph's was one of the 139 missionary boarding schools that indigenous children were required to Attend as mandated by the Canadian government in 1894 to help solve the Indian problem through assimilation. There were a hundred such schools in the U.S. the last one closed in 1997. An investigation that was opened in 2021 in Canada revealed that rape and infanticide were were not uncommon in these schools. My guest is Noisekat's son, Julian Brave. Noisekat, Julian's father, is from a reservation in British Columbia. He left the reservation and moved to the US and married a white woman. Julian is their son and he grew up in Oakland. His parents divorced when he was 6, but his mother was determined to find ways to connect Julian with Native culture. She succeeded. She made sure he spent a lot of time on his paternal family's reservation and with a native group in Californ. He became a champion powwow dancer, a journalist covering indigenous related issues and an activist. Last year he co directed a documentary called Sugar Cane about the investigation into the mission schools, their often brutal treatment of children and the infanticide. Julian and his father are among the people who appear in the film. The documentary also explores Julian's relationship with his father. Sugar Cane is the name of a reservation near St. Joseph's the documentary won the directing award at the 2024 at Sundance Film Festival, won best documentary from the National Board of Review, and was nominated for a Peabody and an Oscar. Now Julian Brave NoiseCat has written a new book called We Survived the Night. It's part memoir, part indigenous history and part Coyote stories. Coyote is the shape shifting trickster who was regarded by many Native tribes as the ancestor sent by the Creator to finish creating the indigenous world. Julian Brave NoiseCat, welcome to FRESH AIR. I enjoyed the book and I also learned a lot, which I appreciate.
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Julian Brave NoiseCat
Thank you so much. It's an honor to be on FRESH air. This is honestly a dream come true for me, Terry.
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Terry Gross
I really am honored to hear you say that. So the investigation into St. Joseph's mission found that infanticide was common there. Students were sometimes raped by the priests or other staff. And when a student was pregnant, the baby was often aborted or disposed of. But rape wasn't your father's backstory. Tell us to the best of your knowledge what his story is.
- [05:35]
Julian Brave NoiseCat
So my father was discovered in the trash incinerator at St. Joseph's Mission on the night of August 16, 1959. The night watchman Tony Stoop described his cries for life as sounding like the noise of a cat, which I only bring up because my last name is Noise Cat, which is kind of unbelievable to me because it only became Noise Cat. My last name after it was written down wrong by those same missionaries who came to our land to turn us into Catholics.
- [06:05]
Terry Gross
And it was written down long before your father was born. So they didn't know his backstory.
- [06:10]
Julian Brave NoiseCat
Yes. So it was a story and a name that really found its meaning in his survival, which is. You know, there are subjects in the book that I think get at questions of the presence of ancestors and forces greater than human ones in our present life. And, you know, I didn't know the story of my father's birth until I set out to write this book and to make sugar cane. And so there is also an element of telling these stories that is about touching the family histories that even your own family is too scared to tell. And so while there's a piece of this story that, of course, the church and the government, you know, is not talking about, there's also an element of that silence that has been internalized by native families like my own.
- [07:05]
Terry Gross
So you're saying that you didn't know your father's origin story until you. You started doing the book and the documentary?
- [07:13]
Julian Brave NoiseCat
No, he did not either. All that he knew was that he had been born somewhere near Williams Lake and found not long after in a dumpster. And it was kind of a hazy story. Other than that, we didn't really know that there was much involving the residential school, and we really didn't know the circumstances around all of it until the documentary in the book.
- [07:32]
Terry Gross
And it's remarkable that he survived. So what did you learn about why it was his mother who actually put him there?
- [07:43]
Julian Brave NoiseCat
Well, you know, I think that this is part of the history of colonization that has often been remarked on by scholars of colonialism. You know, Frantz Fanon, for example, talked about the way that the colonized subject sometimes internalizes the oppression of colonialism. And I think it makes discussing these subjects that much more difficult for the very people who sometimes survived them. You know, the truth of the matter is, is that at these schools, children were abused, and sometimes those children grew up to themselves, become abusers. That at these schools, native children were separated from their parents and therefore did not necessarily know how to parent. So when it was their turn to do that, they turned around and abandoned their own. And I think that the story with my father is one where, you know, my grandmother at the time was a very young, unwed mother. My grandfather was a bit of a womanizer, as I write in the book. And there was this process at the residential school wherein unwed mothers with unwanted babies had a certain set of protocols it appears that they might be able to follow if they wanted to get rid of that unwanted Native child, which mirrored really, in a sense, what was happening to Native children more broadly in society, because we were, of course, considered an Indian problem and our way of life, if not our people as a whole, were supposed to die.
- [09:07]
Terry Gross
Your grandmother tried to keep this a secret all her life.
- [09:12]
Julian Brave NoiseCat
Yeah, she. We actually learned through the research in We Survived the Night and the documentary Sugarcane that she's the only person who was ever punished for the pattern of infanticide at St. Joseph's Mission, even though she was just a 20 year old mother at the time. And as the local paper itself commented back when this happened in 1959, there's no way that she could have delivered the baby and put it into the incinerator minutes later without someone else's help. And that, of course, that pattern also raises questions about, in the words of the paper back then, quote, unquote, routine procedure at St. Joseph's Mission. But, you know, I think that there's also a lot of, understandably, a lot of guilt and pain and shame associated with having done something like that. And so to this day, her and my father have never really been able to have a full conversation about that circumstance of his birth.
- [10:09]
Terry Gross
Was she devastated when she found out that you knew and that he knew, your father knew?
- [10:15]
Julian Brave NoiseCat
Well, the curious thing about it is that it was kind of a open secret in a sense. So on the one hand, my family never talked about it, and my father didn't really know the specifics around what happened when he was born and how he was found. On the other hand, when I was a teenager, I had heard what I assumed at the time were ghost stories about babies being born at St. Joseph's Mission being put into the trash incinerator there. And just to give you a sense of how internalized the denial was even within Native communities and families, I did not believe those stories when I heard them back then. You know, when I went to learn language from my Kia, who is one of the last two remaining fluent speakers on the Cannam Lake Indian Reserve, it's her and her sister.
- [11:08]
Terry Gross
Kia means grandmother.
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Julian Brave NoiseCat
Kia means grandmother. Yes. You know, I asked her a little bit about what happened at the residential schools, and it became very clear with the couple stories that she was only willing to tell that it was not a subject that she ever felt, you know, willing to open up about. And that remains her truth. And at the end of the day, you know, that is how she has survived. And you Know, I think that that is very understandable, given the weight of the pain that she carries.
- [11:39]
Terry Gross
Did your father or did you try to talk to her about that?
- [11:43]
Julian Brave NoiseCat
Yeah, actually, the. The culminating scene in Sugarcane is a scene where me and my dad go visit Mike, and he, you know, tries to have a con with her about it. And you hear her break open, she cries and, you know, she says that she still struggles to talk about it and that it's something that hurts her.
- [12:07]
Terry Gross
You know, to this day, I'm assuming that just about everyone or everyone on the reservation was forced to go to one of these, you know, missionary boarding schools where part of the goal was to convert native people into Catholicism. Does the old religion or lore still get followed, or are people genuinely Catholic on the reservation now?
- [12:40]
Julian Brave NoiseCat
It's a big mix. Our way of life really did nearly die out until recent decades. It started to finally come back. But, you know, my Kia, for example, still goes to church. I go to Christmas mass with her. I could do the hymns in Sekwep Mokhchin, our indigenous language. One of them goes, O tel te miuch. You know, we do the whole thing in our own way. And at the same time, you know, we have our own belief systems, our own way of worship, of prayer. We have our own way of telling stories and accounting for the creation of the world. And those were nearly lost because of schools like St. Joseph's Mission. You know, for example, I had never heard anyone other than a single uncle tell a coyote story, except for once in my entire life. And so, you know, we really did almost lose so much of our. Of our. Of our way, of our culture. And our language is almost gone now, but it is starting to come back, which is a really beautiful thing.
- [13:45]
Terry Gross
What's an example of a custom that still remains, for instance, surrounding death?
- [13:51]
Julian Brave NoiseCat
Well, that's one of the most interesting things about our culture, I would say, is that despite the fact that we've lost so many different parts of what it is to be Sekwetmaq, what it is to be a Shuswap person, we still bury our dead in a way that remains true to our customs and practices, which I think is because our people want to make sure that when we send our own to the afterlife, that they remain a part of us. And, you know, there are some mixtures in. Of Catholic rites and things like that. But ultimately, the way that we do it, which includes playing the gambling game how late at night, singing a crossover song for the person as they go to the other side, giving away their goods and Materials abstaining from certain things for an entire year. Those are practices that go back generations, maybe even thousands of years.
- [14:47]
Terry Gross
Why a gambling song as part of a death or mourning ceremony?
- [14:52]
Julian Brave NoiseCat
You know, I've thought about that myself. Lahal is about, in part, the spiritual power of the people who are playing it. So you're. The way that the game works is one team is singing a song and trying to hide two sets of bones. Usually it's deer bones, and one bone has a mark in it, and the other bone is unmarked, and the other team is trying to guess which hand the unmarked bone is on. The opposite team, as they're singing a song and trying to sort of fake them out and use their spiritual power to hide the bones. And there's an element of, like, sort of reawakening your spirit and acknowledging the greater than human power that we all sort of carry in our soul. In that, I would also say that it's a way to sort of redistribute goods and wealth and these sorts of things. Part of what happens at the La Hal Games is that money or different goods, I mean, back in the day, like horses and guns and those sorts of things would be given away, and that's to, you know, redistribute what belonged to the family of the deceased to honor that person and also to get people to come to these, you know, these funerals. It's really important for us that our whole community comes together to honor the dead. And. And when you go to a funeral in Cannon Lake, you know, it is a real event. It's a real celebration. Hundreds of people show up.
- [16:17]
Terry Gross
Can you sing the song that you just referred to, or would it be inappropriate to sing it now?
- [16:23]
Julian Brave NoiseCat
There's a lot of different versions of Lahau song, so this is kind of a mix between a Lahal song and a. And a protest song. So it goes like this. Hey, hey O hey, hey, hey oh, yeah hey, hey, hey Canada is all Indian land Canada is all Indian land oh, Canada is all Indian land Yahoo. Hey, Yahoo.
- [17:05]
Terry Gross
I see what you mean by protest song.
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Julian Brave NoiseCat
Sometimes they do sing that for Lahal, though, so that counts.
- [17:11]
Terry Gross
Okay.
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Sam Briger
We're listening to Terry Gross's interview with Julian Brave Noisecat. His new book is called We Survived the Night. We'll hear more of their conversation after a break. I'm Sam Brigger, and this is Fresh.
- [17:23]
Announcer
Air Weekend support for this podcast and the following message come from Ameriprise Financial chief economist Russell Price shares a key investment principle.
- [17:34]
Bill Murray
Market trends tend to tell us that time is on the side of the investor. Remaining invested through periods of highs and lows is generally one of the better ways to build wealth over the long term.
- [17:46]
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- [18:00]
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- [18:24]
Terry Gross
Your father left the reservation when he was in his teens or twenties. How old was he?
- [18:29]
Julian Brave NoiseCat
He was in his twenties, early twenties.
- [18:32]
Terry Gross
Why was he anxious to leave?
- [18:34]
Julian Brave NoiseCat
Well, when you were called the garbage can kid when you were growing up, you know, there's a lot of stuff to run from. And that was just the beginning of his story. You know, he had a very troubling childhood. It was a dysfunctional time to be an Indian anywhere in North America, and particularly on the Canem Lake Res, where our people were really messed up by what happened at St. Joseph's Mission. People were dying left and right. There was all kinds of abuse. Alcoholism was rampant. I mean, it was a pretty dark era. So he got out essentially as soon as he could. He went to Vancouver, where he attended art school, which was a complete accident. He actually was intending to take classes to become a PE teacher. And then the campus that was closest to where he lived, they didn't actually have those classes, so they just enrolled him in some art classes. And he ended up getting really good at this technique of printmaking called stone lithography. So he went on to Emily Carr College and then found his way into a job at a printmaking fine art print press in New York called Tyler Graphics, which is actually where he moved, and then met my mother in a bar outside the city.
- [19:42]
Terry Gross
I should mention here that he has work in the Smithsonian.
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Julian Brave NoiseCat
He does, yes, in the collection of the National Museum of the American Indian.
- [19:49]
Terry Gross
And he's also a wood sculptor.
- [19:51]
Julian Brave NoiseCat
He is, yeah. So he began his career as a as a fine art printmaker, but he could never really suffer a boss. So he ended up becoming an artist. And when he was in Vancouver in the 80s was a really interesting place to be for Native art. There was kind of a renaissance happening in the art of the Northwest coastal Native peoples. Your listeners might be familiar with, like totem poles and Masks and those sorts of artworks. Well, that was really what was coming back in Vancouver in the 1980s. So he got to see some of the greats of that era, guys like Bo Dick and Bill Reed, who did a piece that was on the Canadian $20 bill for many years. He got to see them actually work. And he had been building houses when he was in his 20s, and his father was really good with his hands, and he watched them do it, and he was like, you know what? I think I could do that. And so he embarked on his own artistic career, wherein he started carving. And he got really good at it.
- [20:51]
Terry Gross
Yeah. So your father is a very gifted artist, but he also became an alcoholic. He became irresponsible after he married your mother. And your parents divorced when you were six and you felt abandoned. You really, like, loved your father and really looked up to him. And later on you realized that he was abandoned by his mother and you felt like. And then he abandoned you. And I want to play a scene from the Sugar Cane documentary in which you're talking to your father and you're basically confronting him about this.
- [21:34]
Julian Brave NoiseCat
I guess I just feel like I'm here trying to help you when you don't really fully recognize the thing that we share, your story is someone who is abandoned, but also who abandoned.
- [21:49]
Bill Murray
You're looking for some kind of acknowledgment from me?
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Julian Brave NoiseCat
You know, I just feel like.
- [21:55]
John Candy
Actually.
- [21:56]
Bill Murray
Yeah, well, tell me what you want. I'll write it. Whatever you want. You know, it's just like, I didn't leave you, son.
- [22:06]
Julian Brave NoiseCat
Yeah, you did.
- [22:08]
Bill Murray
What was I supposed to do? And I was lost in a drunk, just going like a madman at the time that I told your mom, I don't know what the hell is wrong. I'm crying my eyes up every day. And I don't know why. That's what I said to her.
- [22:40]
Terry Gross
Doing a scene like that on camera and including it in a movie, did it make it easier to have a conversation or make it more difficult with both of you being kind of self conscious, having this groundbreaking confrontation, Your father in tears, and he wasn't the kind of guy who cried a whole lot. And you're doing it, like, in public. Yeah. Do you have any regrets about it?
- [23:06]
Julian Brave NoiseCat
No, no. Definitely no regrets. You know, I think that part of what made it possible for us to go on that road trip and to have intense conversations, like that confrontation that you see in Sugarcane, was that I moved in with my dad, actually, and lived with him for two years while we worked on Sugarcane and While I wrote my first book, We Survived the Night. And so after not living together for 22 years, I mean, he left when I was about 6 years old. Suddenly we were living across the hallway from each other and he'd spend his days out in the carving shed in the garage and I'd be working on my book and working on sugar cane. And then at night we'd hang out and we got to know each other a lot better. I'd turn on my recorder and he'd tell me stories from his life that I'd never heard before. He learned a little bit more about mine and we really did become like best friends. And so I think that that relationship that was really rebuilt because I did make the choice to move back in with him to create some opportunity for reconciliation. Also made it possible for us to have real and hard conversations like the one that you see in the film.
- [24:12]
Terry Gross
Well, I thank you so much for talking with us. It's really been a pleasure.
- [24:15]
Julian Brave NoiseCat
Cook's Jam Terry it's been a dream come true for me.
- [24:18]
Sam Briger
Julian Brave Neistcat's new book is called We Survived the Night. He spoke with Terry Gross. John Candy, the comic actor who rose to fame in Second City TV and in such films as Stripes, Splash and Spaceballs, died at the age of 43 in 1994. Now, 31 years later, a new documentary pays tribute to Candy and does so in a very intimate and affectionate way. It's called John I Like Me and it's now streaming on Prime Video. Our TV critic David Biancooley has this review.
- [24:57]
David Biancolli
This new movie length documentary about John Candy is subtitled I Like Me for a Reason. That's the line that Candy says to Steve Martin partway through their film Planes, Trains and Automobiles after Martin's character has bombarded Candy's character with a string of increasingly mean insults. By the end of that movie, the vulnerability and likability of Candy's character has won Martin's character over. This documentary has the same effect. Even if you know little about John Candy, by the time this film is over, you'll miss him a lot. John Candy, I Like Me takes a chronological approach to its subject, but not a typical one. It's more than 20 minutes into the movie before we see any real samples of Candy the performer. We first learn about the type of person he was growing up in Canada. He listened to Fireside Theatre comedy records and played football until he injured his knee and had his kneecap removed. Not replaced, removed. We hear from his widow, his now adult children his friends and other relatives, and also from a ridiculously long list of colleagues, co stars and fellow celebrities, all of whom seem all too happy to share the most personal of stories. One of them is Bill Murray, who joined Toronto's Second City Improv stage group when Candy did.
- [26:24]
Bill Murray
We started the same time and we were the worst. We jumped into a show and they gave us stuff to do, but then you'd have to. The second part of the show was you had to improvise and no one wanted to work with us because we didn't know what we were doing. So we'd only work with each other. But we were confident. We had a lot of confidence. I don't think people today realize how bad you have to be in order to be a perfectionist. You have to be bad and know you're bad, because there's nothing like being really bad to make you want to be better.
- [26:56]
David Biancolli
Murray talks about some of the alter egos Candy adopted on stage and off stage too, like Johnny Toronto, who acted like he owned the city. Eventually, Murray points out, John Candy would become Johnny Toronto, beloved by that city, co owning a Canadian Football League team with hockey superstar Wayne Gretzky and becoming famous as a TV and movie star. That fame started with Second City TV, also known as SCTV, which began in Canada in 1976 and quickly was imported to the US. It was a low budget syndicated alternative to Saturday Night Live, which had begun on NBC the year before. I loved SCTV the first moment I saw it, and so did Tom Hanks, who recalls stumbling upon it while touring a stage show in Canada as a member of Cleveland's Great Lakes Shakespeare Festival. The first sketch he saw was a long parody of Leave it to Beaver with Harold Ramis as the neighbor kid Whitey and John Candy as the beaver.
- [28:02]
Bill Murray
It was kind of like the promise of that very first time that I saw him, this subtle, big, grown up guy dressed up as Jerry Mather, saying, I don't know.
- [28:10]
Announcer
Gee, Wally, that Eddie Haskell, he really makes me mad.
- [28:13]
Julian Brave NoiseCat
Why don't you kill him?
- [28:14]
Bill Murray
Nah, I could go to jail.
- [28:16]
Julian Brave NoiseCat
Besides, it's against the law. But Beaver, no one would have to.
- [28:19]
Terry Gross
Know that you did it.
- [28:20]
Julian Brave NoiseCat
I don't know, Whitey.
- [28:21]
Bill Murray
I don't even have a gun.
- [28:23]
Sam Briger
Come on, Beaver.
- [28:24]
David Biancolli
Tom Hanks is the father of actor Colin Hanks, who directs John Candy. I like me. That may explain why Tom Hanks is interviewed, but it also might explain the appreciation Colin Hanks shows as both director and interviewer for the process of acting and of what being the friend or loved one of an actor is like. Because of Second City, we hear from Catherine o', Hara, Andrea Martin, Martin Short, Dave Thomas and others. Because of John Candy's long string of movies, we hear from Steve Martin, Mel Brooks and Macaulay Culkin, who speaks admiringly of Candy's many films with writer director John Hughes. Those films include Planes, Trains and Automobiles and with Culkin, both Home Alone and Uncle Buck. If you're gonna associate an actor with.
- [29:14]
Terry Gross
John Hughes, a lot of people think.
- [29:15]
Julian Brave NoiseCat
Like, oh, Molly Ringwald or something like that. And it's like, notes John Candy. I've done as many John Hughes movies as Molly Ringwald. We've both done three.
- [29:22]
Sam Briger
I think.
- [29:23]
Julian Brave NoiseCat
He didn't. Candy did nine.
- [29:24]
Sam Briger
You should associate those two.
- [29:27]
David Biancolli
One scene from Candy's film career that this documentary is smart enough to present intact comes from Uncle Buck. It features John Candy and 8 year old Macaulay Culkin meeting and asking questions of one another in a parody of the interrogation style of dialogue made famous by Jack Webb in Dragnet. It worked in 1989 and it works now.
- [29:50]
John Candy
Where do you live?
- [29:51]
Announcer
In the city.
- [29:52]
Terry Gross
Do you have a house?
- [29:52]
John Candy
Apartment On a rent.
- [29:54]
Bill Murray
Rent.
- [29:54]
John Candy
What do you do for a living?
- [29:55]
Bill Murray
Lots of things.
- [29:56]
Terry Gross
Where's your office?
- [29:57]
Bill Murray
I don't have one.
- [29:57]
John Candy
How come?
- [29:58]
Bill Murray
I don't need one.
- [29:59]
Terry Gross
Where's your wife?
- [29:59]
Bill Murray
Don't have one.
- [30:00]
Terry Gross
How come?
- [30:01]
Bill Murray
It's a long story.
- [30:01]
Terry Gross
Do you have kids?
- [30:02]
Bill Murray
No, I don't.
- [30:03]
Terry Gross
How come?
- [30:03]
Bill Murray
It's an even longer story.
- [30:05]
Terry Gross
Are you my dad's brother?
- [30:06]
Bill Murray
What's your record for consecutive questions asked?
- [30:08]
Terry Gross
38.
- [30:09]
David Biancolli
We also hear from others, like Conan O', Brien, an unabashed John Candy fan in college who invited him to visit the Harvard campus and spend, specifically the Harvard Lampoon, which Conan edited. Conan was astounded that Candy came, amazed by how nice and how present he was, and influenced by a piece of advice Candy gave him at the time.
- [30:31]
Announcer
I remember admitting to him that I.
- [30:33]
Julian Brave NoiseCat
Was very interested in comedy and I might even want to try it. I'll never forget this. He looked me square in the eye and he said, you don't try it. You either do it or you don't do it. You don't try it, kid. And that spoke to me like, all in, kid, all in or not at all.
- [30:53]
David Biancolli
I wish this documentary included more samples from Candy's brilliant characters on sctv. And there's virtually no mention of the David Steinberg show, the Canadian TV series preceding SCTV that gave Candy an even earlier break in 1972. But I felt happy and at times a little sad watching John Candy, I Like Me Colin Hanks does a fine job of profiling a gifted comic and actor, and by all accounts a very sweet human being. And after you watch the documentary, Prime Video has a handy selection of John Candy movies to dive into, including Uncle Buck, Planes, Trains and Automobiles and Spaceballs. I highly recommend taking that plunge. John Candy, I like him too.
- [31:43]
Sam Briger
Dava B. And Cooley review John Candy, I Like Me, which is streaming on Prime Video. Coming up, we hear from Grammy Award winning singer and musician Levy. This is FRESH AIR Weekend.
- [31:55]
Announcer
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- [33:03]
Terry Gross
Is@Macfound.Org this is FRESH AIR WEEKEND. I'm Terry Gross. My guest Levy is a singer, cellist, pianist, guitarist and songwriter, whose 2023 album Bewitched was the first album ever to top Billboard's jazz and traditional jazz charts in its first week of release. But is she a jazz artist? Only partially. Her 2023 album Bewitched won a Grammy for Best Traditional Pop Album and was named Crossover Album of the Year by Variety. Her music resembles her personal identity in that both are hard to categorize. Her songs draw on her deep knowledge of classical music and jazz, as well as from pop and classic musicals. She grew up in Reykjavik, ICELAND and Washington, D.C. with a mother who emigrated from China and is a violinist with the Iceland Symphony Orchestra. Her father is from Iceland, and Levi grew up listening to recordings from his jazz collection. She started piano lessons at age 4, cello lessons at age 8, and performed on cello with the Iceland Symphony Orchestra when she was 15. She describes her music as taking inspiration from the past, with lyrics firmly rooted in the present. Her concerts are filled with listeners in their 20s who may not know or care much about jazz or classical music. Levi is 26. She started attracting an audience during the COVID lockdown when she began posting videos of her singing jazz standards and originals, accompanying herself on cello, guitar, or piano. She brought her guitar with her today to play and sing some songs, including music from her new album, A Matter of Time. Let's start with a track called Clockwork. It's an upbeat love song with an obvious jazz influence. So here's Clockwork.
- [34:52]
Levi (musician)
Swore I'd never do this again Think that I'm so clever I could date a friend he just called me said he's running late like me he probably had to regurgitate. I know it's irrational at least I'm self aware I'm shivering maybe I'll stay home oh no, he's here. My wild place I've considered every way words don't forget Deeply regret he'll run.
- [35:35]
Terry Gross
Away.
- [35:38]
Levi (musician)
And nothing brings me fear like meeting with my destiny but like clockwork Think he fell in love with me.
- [35:52]
Terry Gross
Levi, welcome to FRESH air. It's a pleasure to have you on the show, and thank you for bringing your guitar with you. We'll hear some music in a couple of minutes. You're so popular, especially among people in their 20s. Your first music festival was when you performed at Lollapalooza and you brought an orchestra with you. What insights does that offer about who you are and about your music?
- [36:16]
John Candy
Well, thank you so much for having me. It's such a pleasure to be here. I mean, Lollapalooza was such a perfect moment for me of showing exactly who I am to the world. Because, I mean, Lollapalooza is a music festival that I would say is for. For modern music and for young people. I've never viewed myself as anything other than a modern artist, but I've always, of course, loved classical music and jazz music and had a love for all things a bit older. So to get to bring an orchestra and that sound onto such a modern stage, I mean, we had a K pop act playing after us and a rapper before us on that very same stage. I think it's so beautiful that all of these different styles of music can exist in one.
- [37:02]
Terry Gross
And what does it say that you'd never been to a music festival?
- [37:06]
John Candy
I mean, I'd been to Newport Jazz Festival, so that might answer your question, I guess. I mean, I grew up in Iceland, so I just wasn't very close to that culture. We had our own smaller festivals.
- [37:22]
Terry Gross
But let's talk a little bit about your musical origin story. Your mother plays violin in the Iceland Symphony Orchestra. What did you learn about music from hearing her practice at home?
- [37:34]
John Candy
I learned a couple of things. I think, like, hard work is really, really important, and it's something you need to keep up. I mean, my mom has been in the orchestra for almost 30 years, and she still practices every single day for every single concert. It's not something you shelve after you grow up and. But it also has taught me that it's something that never really leaves you. Growing up in a musical family. I mean, my grandma's 80 something now, and she still plays piano every single day just like as she did when she was seven. So it's taught me that it's kind of this thing that can follow you forever. But my mom always talked about especially like the beauty of music and how it has to come from your heart. And I think that's been such an important through line with. With my music, no matter what genre it's leaning towards.
- [38:24]
Terry Gross
Did you grow up backstage?
- [38:26]
John Candy
Oh, absolutely. I grew up on stage. I think I have stories of my mom playing some contemporary Icelandic composers. And it was really loud, and every break she would check her tummy like, I have a twin sister. So the two of us were in there and she was like, are they still moving? Did we silence them?
- [38:46]
Terry Gross
When you started taking music lessons, would your mother ever holler from another room, wrong note?
- [38:51]
John Candy
Every single day?
- [38:52]
Terry Gross
Really?
- [38:53]
John Candy
Not from another room, the same room.
- [38:57]
Terry Gross
Did that make you self conscious? Practicing with a pro with an earshot all the time.
- [39:02]
John Candy
It was like having a teacher every single day. I would practice piano while my sister was practicing violin. And then we would swap and she would practice piano and I would practice cello. And my mom spent the entire afternoon just drifting back and forth from the piano room to the string room to the piano room to the string room. And it was very disciplined. But I'm so thankful for that. And my mom still tells me if I'm playing out of tune, and I'm so thankful for her for that. And I think it's one of the reasons I'm the musician I am today.
- [39:33]
Terry Gross
So you listened to a lot of jazz growing up because your father had a big jazz collection. What era or what songs or singers particularly influenced you?
- [39:46]
John Candy
I think Ella Fitzgerald was the. The very first singer that I really felt that I vocally resonated with. I think she just sounded like a cello. So I immediately was like, oh, I want to sound like her. And I was having trouble finding songs in my range to sing. But Ella's range, though more than bigger than mine. Still, my. The her singing style, I seem to fall most naturally into that kind of style. Same with Billie Holiday. And I also loved Nat King Cole and Julie London and Peggy Lee and Doris Day. It was kind of, you know, that type of era of mid century singing that I really was drawn to.
- [40:35]
Terry Gross
Would you play a standard for us that you particularly liked?
- [40:40]
John Candy
Yeah.
- [40:41]
Terry Gross
Do you want to do it could happen to you?
- [40:44]
Sponsor Announcer
Yes.
- [40:45]
Terry Gross
And let's mention here that this is one of the things that kind of put you on the map because you recorded this on your phone during COVID and I think it's the first and one of the first videos that you put out on YouTube.
- [40:58]
John Candy
Yes. Covid started and I had what I thought would be a two week break, so I thought I'd used that time to just post videos of myself singing online. And it started with a lot of jazz standards, and I was playing the jazz standards on cello and singing along. And yeah, I did a cover of it could happen to you and also of the song I wish you love. And the two of those kind of hit the algorithm or whatever you say. They kind of definitely were the first things that I think people were like, what? Why is this girl, this young woman, playing cello and singing? It was like multiple things they hadn't seen combined together.
- [41:42]
Terry Gross
Yeah. And Chet Baker has a great recording of this.
- [41:45]
John Candy
Yes. Yeah, that's my favorite Chet Baker album. The It Could Happen to you one.
- [41:49]
Terry Gross
So. Okay. And this is Levy.
- [41:54]
Levi (musician)
Hide your heart from sight Lock your dreams up at night it could happen to you don't count stars or you might stumble Someone drops a sigh and down you tumble Keep an eye on spring Rum wound Church bells ring it could happen to you All I did was wonder how your arms would be and it happen to me.
- [42:46]
Terry Gross
Thank you. That was Leve singing and playing guitar, and she has a new album called Matter of Time. So you grew up in two extremes. You grew up in Iceland, but you also spent a lot of time in Washington, dc. What were you doing there? What was your family doing there?
- [43:05]
John Candy
My father was working for the Icelandic government there, but my mom would sub with the Baltimore Symphony when she was there. So I kind of got to be a little bit of an American kid for a bit, which I think having a childhood in America is really where I fell in love with a great American songbook.
- [43:24]
Terry Gross
What was your father doing in the government?
- [43:27]
John Candy
He was working for the imf, the.
- [43:30]
Terry Gross
International Monetary Fund, yes. So two extremes. Like Iceland is like remote. It's a small country, it's very cold. Washington D.C. is one of the capitals of the world, not just the capital of the US and it's so busy. What was it like growing up in two pretty opposite worlds? It's certainly a lot warmer and swampier than certainly. Yeah, than Iceland. Yeah.
- [43:56]
John Candy
I think it's one of the most important experiences that I've gone through. I had a very deep understanding of how big the world was from a very early age because I would still spend my summers in China. And the three are so, so, so, so different, I think, from what I really Learned from Washington D.C. i think especially was just how multicultural it was. I mean, I went to a public school in D.C. and even within just my neighborhood school, I think 90% of my class was international kids. And I was such a naturally multicultural kid. It made me quite happy. I also loved all the museums and I remember going to the ballet at the Kennedy center and the symphony. And I just have very beautiful memories from growing up there. And like, I remember moving back to Iceland when I was 8 or 9. And I remember that it felt like the world fell dark for a little bit because there was so much brightness in Washington, which is sounds like a crazy thing to say right now, but I think it really just opened my eyes up to how very big the world is because Washington D.C. is also such a unique city within the United States.
- [45:12]
Terry Gross
Well, since you're half Chinese and half Icelandic and you grew up in Iceland, not a lot of Chinese people in Iceland. So being half Chinese was probably considered unusual, maybe even like, quote, exotic. But growing up in Washington, there's like lots of people from China and other Asian countries. So what was it like for you to be so unusual in such a homogenous place as Iceland?
- [45:41]
John Candy
It was really difficult, I think. Iceland is so small and it's lovely and I miss it every single day. But it was very hard as a kid to comprehend why I didn't look like everyone else or how my interests were different. There weren't many kids around me taking a competitive pre professional classical music route. There weren't many kids around me who had to go back home and practice every single day. And I often felt like my voice wasn't being heard. And I was ready to do anything to get my voice to be heard. And I knew that the first step to that was trying to get out of Iceland and see if perhaps my voice would resonate more in the big world where I wasn't an odd fish.
- [46:30]
Terry Gross
I want to ask you to do another song for us. And this is Castle in Hollywood. Would you give us the backstory for the song?
- [46:38]
John Candy
Yeah. This song is written about a friendship breakup. I found that there are not many songs about breaking up with a friend, but it's a pain that can sometimes be more painful than breaking up with a romantic lover. So I wanted to write about this experience that I had. And I think, especially when women fall apart with women, there's such an interesting line of empathy that's between them. It's. It's kind of like, I'll love you forever but just not don't be around me I rack my brain Spend hours.
- [47:19]
Levi (musician)
And days I still can't fit Figure it out what happened the deer in your house still learning to live without you I wonder what you tell your friends which version of our fairy story the one where you walk out in glory or the night I moved out in the home I think about you always tied together with a string I thought the lilies died by winter Then they bloomed again in spring It's a heartbreak marked the end of my girlhood we'll never go back to that castle in Hollywood.
- [48:09]
Terry Gross
Thank you. That was Levi performing for us. And what was the castle in Hollywood? Was that a fantasy of what you wanted your life to be?
- [48:18]
John Candy
No, I lived in. The first apartment I moved into was this English storybook house in West Hollywood that had a turret, and it was commissioned by Charlie chaplin, actually. In 1928, I believe.
- [48:34]
Terry Gross
Wait, wait. The first apartment that you rented was one that Charlie Chaplin commissioned? How did that happen?
- [48:40]
John Candy
Yeah, pure Internet luck, I think. It was definitely a little scary. It was very dark, but my bedroom was circular. It was inside a turret, and I had a tiny little window with bars on it, like a proper Rapunzel window. And, yeah, it was a really, really weird apartment, but so charming and exactly what my storybook heart craved when I first moved to la.
- [49:10]
Terry Gross
Since you have a jazz set in the middle of your concerts now, when you're on tour, I'm going to ask you to play a jazz original that you wrote. And this is one of your early songs. It's called Valentine.
- [49:23]
John Candy
I've been playing a much more swingy version of this on tour, so it's going to be weird to go back to this version. But this is how I wrote it, so it is how it shall be performed.
- [49:38]
Levi (musician)
I've rejected affection for years and years Now I have it and damn it, it's kind of weird. He tells me I'm pretty Don't know how to respond I tell him that he's pretty too Can I say that? Don't have a clue Every passing moment surprise myself I'm scared of flies I'm scared of guys Someone please help Cuz I think I've fallen in love this time I blinked and suddenly I had a valentine.
- [50:30]
Terry Gross
That's a nice song.
- [50:32]
John Candy
It's sweet. It's very naive. It reminds me of being 21.
- [50:38]
Terry Gross
Falling in love for the first time. Yes. Well, Levi, I want to thank you so much for talking with us and for doing some songs for us. Thank you so much. I wish you well on your tour. And, you know, thank you.
- [50:52]
John Candy
Thank you so much for having me. It's been such an honor.
- [50:55]
Terry Gross
Oh, my pleasure.
- [50:57]
Sam Briger
Levi's new album is A Matter of Time. She spoke with Terry Gross.
- [51:07]
Levi (musician)
But you think you're so poetic quoting epics, an ancient prose.
- [51:18]
Sam Briger
Fresh AIR Weekend is produced by Teresa Madden. Fresh Air's executive producer is Danny Miller. Our technical director and engineer is Audrey Bentham. For Terry Gross and Tanya Mosley, I'm Sam Bruckert.
- [51:31]
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