Sara Bareilles Talks with Rachel Syme

Summary

Podcast Summary: Sara Bareilles Talks with Rachel Syme
The New Yorker Radio Hour
Release Date: January 7, 2025
Host: David Remnick
Guests: Sara Bareilles and Rachel Syme

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Introduction

In this engaging episode of The New Yorker Radio Hour, hosted by David Remnick, singer-songwriter Sara Bareilles engages in a deep and insightful conversation with staff writer Rachel Syme. The discussion traverses Sara’s evolution from a pop music star to a Broadway composer, her creative processes, challenges in the music and theater industries, and her commitment to authentic artistry.

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Songwriting Process

Sara Bareilles opens up about her approach to songwriting, emphasizing the importance of routine and ritual in her creative process.

Sara Bareilles [01:03]: “There are very few times I can think of where I sat down and something just sort of showed up. I really believe in this idea of kind of, you know, the muses visit the artist at work. They reward the person who creates ritual or routine around just showing up and writing.”

She reflects on how her rituals have evolved as she matured, highlighting that creativity is an ever-changing journey.

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Early Career Challenges

Rachel Syme delves into Sara’s early career struggles, particularly with her first record deal where the label sought to pair her with various co-writers. Sara candidly shares her feelings of disconnect and the sacredness she attributes to songwriting.

Sara Bareilles [02:20]: “I can't think of anything more sacred. It's as intimate as it gets. And it is literally an illustration of my relationship with God. It's like that's as close as I get to, like, being naked spiritually for the world.”

Sara describes her disillusionment with the prescribed songwriting sessions, where her individuality felt suppressed in favor of marketable hits.

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'Love Song' – From Despair to Empowerment

The conversation shifts to Sara’s iconic track, "Love Song," exploring its origins not as a product of despair but as a moment of personal discovery and defiance against commercial pressures.

Sara Bareilles [03:47]: “I think you're right. That wasn't a moment of despair. That was more a moment of discovery. I was listening to the radio, and I was just, like, trying to chip what I heard on the radio. I was trying to mimic.”

Sara explains that "Love Song" was born from her realization of staying true to herself amidst external expectations, serving as a declaration of her artistic autonomy.

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Return to Theater and 'Waitress'

Sara discusses her lifelong passion for theater, inspired by her mother's involvement in community theater. Despite her initial foray into acting being challenging, her encounter with Diane Paulus, the director of Waitress, marked a pivotal moment in her career.

Sara Bareilles [06:30]: “I did productions of Little Shop of Horrors, I did Mystery of Edwin Drood, I did Charlotte's Web, and I really thought I would go into theater.”

Her perseverance led her to collaborate on the musical adaptation of Meg Wolitzer's novel The Interestings, blending her musical talents with her theatrical aspirations.

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Collaboration and the Creative Process

Sara emphasizes the transformative power of collaboration in theater, contrasting it with her earlier fears stemming from competitive experiences in the music industry.

Sara Bareilles [07:50]: “In the right kind of collaboration, it can be incredible. You know, the phenomenon of something being bigger than the sum of its parts.”

She highlights the joy and unpredictability of the workshop process, appreciating the iterative nature of developing a new show.

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Comparison of Theater and Music Industries

Sara reflects on her preference for the theater industry over the music industry, citing the former’s collaborative spirit and the genuine celebration of achievements.

Sara Bareilles [09:04]: “I just felt like I'd been at the wrong party my whole career.”

She contrasts the competitive, fast-paced environment of music with the supportive, communal atmosphere of theater, expressing a desire to be part of a community that values collective success over individual competition.

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Music as Connection and Expression

Addressing her song "Gravity," Sara shares her intent to create music that resonates with others' experiences, fostering a sense of shared emotion and understanding.

Sara Bareilles [10:32]: “My hope is as a songwriter, I can work to articulate things that maybe you wouldn't quite know how to say. Or other people feel like I'm the only person who feels this. And then like, wait, she must feel it too, because it's right there in the song.”

She conveys the enduring relevance of her music, rooted in her past emotions but continuously connecting with listeners in new ways.

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Balancing Art and Commerce

Rachel Syme references a poignant line from Sara’s book regarding the tension between art and business. Sara elaborates on maintaining artistic integrity amidst the pressures of commercial success.

Sara Bareilles [16:07]: “I think art doesn't have time for that. Because I think creation is a holy act. I think it's like ministry to take care of the world with making art.”

Sara advocates for prioritizing genuine creative expression over commercial motivations, emphasizing the sacredness of the artistic process.

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Mentoring Younger Artists

In her forties, Sara feels a profound responsibility to mentor the next generation of artists by embodying authenticity and openness about her own journey.

Sara Bareilles [17:39]: “I feel like that's the thing I feel responsibility to, is to keep trying to show up authentically. And I'm not always gonna get it right. And it's gonna piss people off sometimes, but it really matters to me.”

She underscores the importance of vulnerability and authenticity in fostering a supportive environment for emerging artists.

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Conclusion

The episode concludes with Sara Bareilles reflecting on her journey, emphasizing the importance of staying true to oneself and the transformative power of both music and theater. Her candid insights offer a compelling narrative of resilience, authenticity, and the relentless pursuit of artistic integrity.

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Notable Quotes with Timestamps:

• Sara Bareilles [01:03]: “There are very few times I can think of where I sat down and something just sort of showed up. I really believe in this idea of kind of, you know, the muses visit the artist at work.”

• Sara Bareilles [03:47]: “That wasn't a moment of despair. That was more a moment of discovery.”

• Sara Bareilles [07:50]: “In the right kind of collaboration, it can be incredible.”

• Sara Bareilles [09:04]: “I just felt like I'd been at the wrong party my whole career.”

• Sara Bareilles [10:32]: “My hope is as a songwriter, I can work to articulate things that maybe you wouldn't quite know how to say.”

• Sara Bareilles [16:07]: “I think art doesn't have time for that. Because I think creation is a holy act.”

• Sara Bareilles [17:39]: “I feel like that's the thing I feel responsibility to, is to keep trying to show up authentically.”

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This comprehensive summary captures the essence of Sara Bareilles's conversation on The New Yorker Radio Hour, offering listeners a nuanced understanding of her artistic journey, creative philosophies, and personal insights.

Transcript

[Sara Bareilles]

Listener support WNYC Studios.

[David Remnick]

This is the.

[Rachel Syme]

New Yorker Radio Hour, a co production of WNYC Studios and the New Yorker.

[David Remnick]

This is the New Yorker Radio Hour. I'm David Remnick. At the New Yorker Festival a couple of months ago, we were joined by Sara Bareilles. Bareilles broke out as a star in pop music in the late aughts with the Grammy Awards to prove it. But she's gone on to have a very different sort of career writing music for Broadway. So on the one hand, Bareilles is busy acting on stage and on television, and on the other, she's busy as a composer and a songwriter. Right now she's adapting Meg Wolitzer's best selling novel, the Interestings for the stage. Along with the playwright Sarah Rule, Sara Bareilles sat down to talk with staff writer Rachel Syme and to play a little music too.

[Rachel Syme]

How do you write a song, Sarah?

[Sara Bareilles]

There are very few times I can think of where I sat down and something just sort of showed up. I really believe in this idea of kind of, you know, the muses visit the artist at work. They reward the person who creates ritual or routine around just showing up and writing. I'm finding that I'm in my 40s now, I'm 44, and my rituals have changed and the process changes, but it's evolving.

[Rachel Syme]

Reading about your first record deal though, and how many co writers they tried to put you with or, you know, there was a sense at the beginning maybe where they didn't let you follow your own nose or trust that you could be on your own. And I know that that was difficult. So, I mean, how did you feel like you had the confidence then to sort of say, I need to be solo here?

[Sara Bareilles]

I wouldn't identify it as confidence. I think it was a kind of desperation. I got set up on all these songwriting sort of dates with very successful songwriters who were writing songs for Avril Lavigne and Kelly Clarkson. And like a lot of my sort of contemporaries, it just didn't resonate. It didn't. It felt like it didn't matter if I was in the room or not. I felt like they were just writing songs and they were just trying to find people to sing them. And songwriting to me has. I can't think of anything more sacred. It's as intimate as it gets. And it is literally an illustration of my relationship with God. It's like that's as close as I get to, like, being naked spiritually for the world. And so the idea that I would sit In a room and have somebody hand me a sheet of paper that had, like, a list of song titles, a lot of them with, like, letters in the title, which, like, too good for you.

[Rachel Syme]

It's like a girl's 5eva joke.

[Sara Bareilles]

I don't think God wants to say that. Just, like. So it kind of. I got. I was in despair, actually, and my manager at the time finally, like, heard me, was like, okay, you don't have to do it anymore. And I think this is where my heart breaks for young artists who don't realize, like, I. Like, you have the power to go home all along. Like, I didn't ever have to do any of that. But I do think I grew from the experience.

[Rachel Syme]

I think people sort of assume that love song was written out of that despair. You know, that song feels so defiant. And I wonder, was it written out of despair, or was it written out of the moment when you got through it and you were thinking, I'm on the other side of this, and you guys can shove it?

[Sara Bareilles]

That's a good question. I think you could shove it. I wish I could have put that in there. I think you're right. That wasn't a moment of despair. That was more a moment of discovery. I was listening to the radio, and I was just, like, trying to cop what I heard on the radio. I was trying to mimic. I was like, oh, it should sound something like this. And I was so angry when I caught myself in that line of thinking, and I said a prayer, and I was like, please, let me just return to myself somehow. Just remember why I'm doing this. Remember what I'm trying to say. And it was a. It was a diary entry. It's like, head underwater, and you tell me to breathe easy. Like. Like this. This time is impossible. You know, I don't want to give you what you're asking for. I don't even know if I knew what they. What I thought they were asking for, except that I knew they wanted a song that. That could go on the radio.

[Rachel Syme]

I know you grew up loving theater, and getting to work on Waitress is your grand return to your early love of theater. So maybe we can start with your early love of theater and then clock up to Waitress.

[Sara Bareilles]

My mom was a very prominent community theater actress in Humboldt county, where I grew up, and she did tons and tons of shows at our repertory theater there. And I would go to the theater, and I went back not that long ago. And in my mind, it is like a palace. And when I went back, I'm like, oh, it's like a 99 seat theater. It's so small and perfect and beautiful. And it was the happiest I ever was, was sitting in a theater seat. And then the idea that I could be a part of productions was just like mind blowing. I did productions of Little Shop of Horrors, I did Mystery of Edwin Drood, I did Charlotte's Web, and I really thought I would go into theater. And then I started writing songs and I moved to LA to go to ucla. And then my music career just sort of foregrounded itself and I got on that ride. Being a touring artist is like, you get on the ride and then you come home and you write a new record and then you get right back on the ride. And I started to feel like I'm. I'll hate this really, really soon. Well, I took this month long Rumspringa in New York and I had a meeting with my brand new theatrical agent. And there. And he's like, there are auditions for a show called into the Woods. And I was like, I love that show. Give me the audition. And I auditioned for Cinderella for the production that was in the park. And when I tell you, I shit the bed. I shit the bed with fury. And I walked out of that room and I was like, there's not even like a world where like, we're like, maybe that went okay. Like, it was so clear. They were like, oh, I hope you'll be okay after this. It was so terrible. And I really, I was so humbled by how little I knew about anything in this industry and then got the opportunity to sit down with Diane Paulus, who was the director of Waitress. And she talked to me about this project. So I was, I thought I would go back to theater as a performer. And then I was like, oh, I don't know how to do that. And then started writing songs.

[Rachel Syme]

So you're approached about Waitress. Diane Paulison, you are having, you know, this wonderful mind meld. You watch the Adrienne Shelley movie and how do you approach this project? I know the first song you wrote for it was she Used to be Mine.

[David Remnick]

She is messy but she's kind. She is lonely most of the time. She is all of this mixed up and baked in a beautiful pie. She is gone but she used to be mine.

[Sara Bareilles]

I was just trying the whole time to just like, act like I knew what I was doing. I do think I have some instincts around. Like, it became clear very quickly that I liked being in these conversations. I liked the puzzle, I liked the questioning of motivation and the Collaboration was very new to me. You know, these songwriters that I got paired with, I think for a long time made me very fearful of collaboration. When it's the right kind of collaboration, it can be incredible. You know, the phenomenon of something being bigger than the sum of its parts.

[Rachel Syme]

Do you like the workshop process for a new show? Because I know you just had your workshop for this, and then it's like you have to go back and tear things apart. Lose numbers, bring numbers in. I mean, is that. Is that exciting to you?

[Sara Bareilles]

If you can let go of the part of you that needs things to be finished quickly or perfect or that you know what anything is or means, if you can let go of that part, then it can be really fun.

[Rachel Syme]

Do you feel like working in the theater sort of like reinvigorated your love of the other side of the industry? Because you were saying, like, it's the hamster wheel, it's the hamster wheel. Do you feel like you felt revived?

[Sara Bareilles]

No, I feel like working in the theater industry only affirmed that. I think the theater industry is the best industry. I think what it affirmed in me is that I just felt like I'd been at the wrong party my whole career. I just. I don't know where I fit in the music industry. People did not give two shits about me until I wrote. Until Waitress was like a musical. And I was like, you guys care about this show, about pie, but you didn't, like, nobody would touch me with a 10 foot pole. There's so much competition in the music industry that I don't. I just. I'm not a competitive person. I don't understand it. It's not that theater isn't competitive. There is that kind of essence as well in some ways. But everybody. There's just sort of this feeling of like everybody's sort of so happy to be there. Like, we got a show, guys.

[Rachel Syme]

They're so grateful to have a patron. Yeah.

[Sara Bareilles]

So I love that feeling. I would rather be at that. I would rather go to the Tonys than, you know, the Emmys or the Oscars.

[Rachel Syme]

But music can be such a bridge. You know, I think about how many people I know that feel so strongly about the song Gravity, for example. I mean, how for you, is music your way of sort of both channeling your own insecurity and all the things you're still dealing with and then trying to connect?

[Sara Bareilles]

I mean, Gravity was a song I wrote from extraordinarily Brokenhearted place. I was 18 when I wrote that song. And I thought, like, the world was ending, and that song now gets to be interpreted and reinterpreted for other people's pain, even though I don't carry that same pain anymore. My hope is as a songwriter, I can work to articulate things that maybe you wouldn't quite know how to say. Or other people feel like I'm the only person who feels this. And then like, wait, she must feel it too, because it's right there in the song.

[David Remnick]

Set me free, leave me be I don't want to fall another moment into your gravity Here I am and I stand so tall I'm just the way I'm supposed to be but you're onto me over me oh you love me cause I'm fragile I thought that I was strong you touch me for a little while and all my fragile strength is gone Set me free, leave me be I don't want to fall another moment into your gravity Here I am and I stand so tall I'm just the way I am supposed to be but you're onto me and all over me I live here on my knees as I try to make you see that you're everything I think I need here on the ground that you're neither friend nor foe Though I can't seem to let you go One thing that I still know is that you're keeping me down.

Sara Bareilla speaking with staff writer Rachel Syme. More in a moment.

[N/A]

This week's episode is sponsored by Neon's film Presence. Directed by Steven Soderbergh and written by David Koepp, Presence is a thrilling new ghost story about a family that moves into a new home and becomes convinced they are not alone. Starring Lucy Liu, Chris Sullivan and Julia Fox, Presence has been hailed as one of the scariest movies you'll see this year. Experience it in theaters on January 24th.

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[Sara Bareilles]

If you looked up at the end.

[N/A]

Of 1945 and you saw a US flag flying overhead, it was more likely that you were living in a colony or occupied zone than on the US Mainland empire. On this week's on the Media from wnyc, Find on the media wherever you get your podcasts.

[Rachel Syme]

I wanted to talk about a sentence from your book that I wanted to sort of hear what you think about it now where you wrote, nothing makes me more panicky and rage filled than the worry that I've done something in order to position myself for business over art. And I wonder where you feel like the seesaw is right now between commerce and art, especially as the music business is ever changing. You know, where. How are you fighting the good fight for art?

[Sara Bareilles]

I don't think art itself is vulnerable. I think artists are vulnerable. I watch a lot of young artists get popular really quickly because of the way the mechanism functions at this point. Like there used to be more time. The idea that like it was a slow burn and there is something valuable about it being a slow burn. And I watch a lot of these young artists freak out, cancel big shows and I don't fault them for this. I feel like the, the exponential growth is more than could possibly be metabolized by an artist at that. You know, you're playing 100 people one day and then two months later you're playing to like, you know, 50,000 people. It's not, it's not normal. I think you have to be really clear on why are you making what you're making. If it's to get magazine covers or if it's to get rich, I would really encourage you to do something else because art doesn't, art doesn't have time for that. Because I think creation is a holy act. I think it is. I think it's. And I think it's like ministry to take care of the world with making art.

[Rachel Syme]

Well, I know you've had the chance to meet and perform with many of your heroes and you know, Carole King and be mentored in the industry a little bit by the people that came before. Do you mean, you know, you're in your 40s now. We talked about that. Do you feel a responsibility to mentor younger artists at this stage?

[Sara Bareilles]

Totally. I mean, I think more than anything I just feel a responsibility to show up authentically. Like I'm someone who I'm aging naturally and I might change my mind about that. But I'm like, what does it look like for me to just be like to not try to hide the person that I am turning into? I'm not trying to piss anybody off by getting wrinkles on my forehead. This is what it looks like when you're lucky enough to grow up and lucky enough to get the age. And so I feel like that's the thing I feel responsibility to, is to keep trying to show up authentically. And I'm not always gonna get it right. And it's gonna piss people off sometimes, but it really matters to me.

[David Remnick]

Sittin in the morning sun I'll be sitting till the evening comes Watching the ships rolling Then I watch them roll.

Away again Songwriter and performer Sara Bareilles. She spoke with the New Yorker's Rachel Syme. I'm David Remnick and that's our program for today. I want to close the program and begin the new year by thanking everyone at the Radio Hour and at the New Yorker and thank you for listening and a happy new year.

[Sara Bareilles]

Now you whistle. Ready? It's terrible. Keep going.

[Rachel Syme]

The New Yorker Radio Hour is a co production of WNYC Studios and the New Yorker. Our theme music was composed and performed by Meryl Garbus of Tune Yards.

[Sara Bareilles]

Okay, so this is my theory. This is my theory. No one can like be tough when they're whistling like that. You were pretty good. You were pretty good.

[Rachel Syme]

This episode was produced by Max Balton, Adam Howard, David Krasnow, Jeffrey Masters, Louis Mitchell, Jared Paul and Ursula Sommer. With guidance from Emily Botin and assistance from Michael May, David Gable, Alex Barsch, Victor Guan and Alejandra Deckett. The New Yorker Radio Hour is supported in part by the Trina Endowment Fund.

[David Remnick]

Wasting time. Wasting.

[Sara Bareilles]

Thank you so much.

[N/A]

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[Madeline Barron]

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[N/A]

You can have all the journalism, the fiction, the film, book and TV reviews, all the cartoons just by going right now to newyorker.com dark plus, there's an incredible archive, a century's worth of award winning work just waiting for you. That's newyorker.com dark and thanks.