- [Becky Voiceover] Sometimes life gives you an opportunity to reflect on what you would do with a clean slate.

Our guest on this episode is the legendary Kathy Mattea, award-winning country music singer and storyteller.

♪ But I've thrown away my compass ♪ ♪ Done with the chart ♪ ♪ I'm tired of spinning around ♪ ♪ Looking for direction ♪ ♪ Northern star ♪ ♪ I'm tired of spinning around ♪ ♪ Now just step out ♪ ♪ Throw my doubt into the sea ♪ ♪ Oh, what's meant to be will be ♪ - [Becky Voiceover] Hailed by "The Washington Post" as one of Nashville's finest song interpreters, two-time Grammy award winner, Kathy Mattea, has enjoyed much success and acclaim during her 35-year career in country, bluegrass, and folk music.

She has had numerous number one country singles, five gold albums, a platinum greatest hits collection, and four CMA awards, including "18 Wheels and a Dozen Roses."

- All right, y'all sing with us.

♪ 18 wheels and a dozen roses ♪ ♪ 10 more miles ♪ ♪ On his four day run ♪ - [Becky Voiceover] Her latest album, "Pretty Bird," produced by her friend and Roots music wizard, Tim O'Brien, is a wide ranging collection of songs that chronicles a period for Kathy of rededication to singing and storytelling.

♪ Tell me what you ache for ♪ ♪ Tell me what you wait for ♪ - [Becky Voiceover] In addition to creating and recording music and performing live on tour, Kathy is known for her servant's heart.

In 2001, she received the Mini Pearl Humanitarian Award, and in the last decade, has been increasingly involved with public broadcasting.

She served as a consultant and onscreen host for Ken Burns' PBS documentary series, "Country Music."

She also currently hosts NPR's long-running radio series, "Mountain Stage."

And Kathy serves Nashville Public Television as a board member and on air host for the series "Aging Matters."

She and her husband, John Vezner, a Grammy award-winning songwriter, make their home in Nashville.

- Wow, Kathy, this is fun, isn't it?

I'm excited about it.

- Me too.

- You and I have had a chance to talk before, but this is really special to me because you're on the board of Nashville Public Television.

You've dedicated a tremendous amount of time to the organization, to public television.

- I love public television.

- Why?

Why?

- Because you get more than sound bites.

My way of putting it is regular television entertains you, public television engages you.

Like they assume you can think and they assume that you have an attention span that's not 30 seconds.

And so you get in depth.

You get the Ken Burns stuff, you know?

You get the really in depth presentations about stuff and nuance.

And I think so much of our cultural discussion is lost nuance.

And I think that as we move into these shifts in our culture, public media gets more and more important.

- So you mentioned Ken Burns and Dayton Duncan was on the show, and such a good friend of yours.

Why was it so important for you to do the Ken Burns Country Music series?

- Oh my gosh.

And what I have said to people is when Ken Burns turns his lens towards your genre, your world, your part of the, you know, your artistic expression, it's quite an honor.

And so I met Dayton, I met Dayton when the Dust Bowl series was out, and he came to Nashville to do a promo thing.

And he just said, he was so casual about it, he said, "Well, you know, I think we're gonna do country music.

Can I call you up sometime and pick your brain?"

I'm like, "Sure."

And then, you know, the next thing I know, we're, you know, it's happening.

- What was the biggest surprise for you when that series was released?

- That there was a segment on my husband writing "Where Have You Been," co-writing "Where Have You Been" with Don Henry, and that they covered that.

That song, you know, you could pick out almost any, there were hundreds of songs you could pick out to highlight.

And I didn't know they were gonna do that.

I mean, I said to them, when it was time to do my Ken Burns interview, which is like a bucket list thing, right?

You know, you get to do a Ken Burns interview.

I mean, you're sitting there trying to maintain and talking to him and you're like, "Ken Burns is asking you questions.

Shh, I can't concentrate."

But I looked at them and I was like, I don't care if every word I said winds up on the cutting room floor.

I couldn't care less.

Like, I have no, all I want is for the best thing.

- Nashville's kinda like a small town in a big city where people just really know each other.

When I look at all the people you've collaborated with and all the people that either they sing back up with you or you sing back up with them, it's like a list of who's who in country music.

What is that that feels so unique to Nashville?

- I feel like I got in on the end of an era and that the sort of the feel of that era still exists, even though the music business in Nashville has gotten much bigger.

When I came to town, if people thought you did good work and they respected you, they would give you a leg up.

They'd try to help you out.

And I think that's still true.

When I came to town, there were six major labels and you could pretty much stand on one corner on Music Row and see the buildings of all of them.

And every year, there was a block party on Music Row and there would be a flatbed truck brought up in front of, right in front of the Musicians Union and they would have a band and hot dogs and everybody would quit working all afternoon and just go have a block party.

- So, how did you get to Nashville?

You're from West Virginia.

- I was sort of the wiz kid of my family and my community and I got into school and wound up skipping the first grade, going straight into second grade after a month.

And I was basically, now they just give me a big dose of Ritalin, you know, and be done with me.

But they didn't do that back then.

And so I was a year ahead of all my friends and I could not find my way until I found music.

And when I found music, I found community and I found a way to be with people.

I was socially awkward 'cause I was young for my age, but my brain was old for my age.

SoI finally settled down and I could be with people with music.

So I always say music saved my life.

I got my first guitar when I was 10 and I joined the choir and I started singing in church.

Everything kind of settled down for me.

And I got to college and met a bunch of people who were as eaten up about music as I was.

They had these big record collections.

I didn't even own a record player.

And they had guitars.

I had a guitar.

And I just would sit in the circles and just learn songs from them and play them songs that I had learned.

And we started writing.

And after my sophomore year, I was a physics and chemistry major.

- Wow.

- Physics and chemistry and engineering.

And I had like a 3.7 grade point average.

- Wow.

- So at the end of my sophomore year, one of the guys that I've been writing music with said, "I'm gonna move to Nashville. "

Well, of course, he was graduating with a Master's degree, you know, and I'm a sophomore.

And I'm 18 in my sophomore year.

- [Becky] Wow.

- And I said, "Well, you know, I'd love to come."

He said, "You're welcome to come with me."

I'm like, I gotta get my degree.

My parents grew up in coal mining towns, you know?

My grandfathers were coal miners.

They were like, you go get a degree, then you can do anything you want.

And I came to realize that if he moved to Nashville and I was stuck in school, that I would never go by myself.

And for the rest of my life, I would wonder what would've happened.

- Wow.

- And one day, I was just sitting at my house in the summer before I wound up moving and I realized, oh my gosh, I have an extra year.

I'm a year younger than everybody in my class.

I could go to Nashville for a year.

If it doesn't work out, I could come back and I won't really have lost anything.

And I was so excited.

I called my mom.

"Mom, I'm so excited.

I'm gonna quit college and move to Nashville with a boy and write songs.

Aren't you happy for me?"

And she said, there was deafening silence on the other end of the phone.

I was just so young and I had so much energy.

I would never have done it if I'd waited another couple years.

- But how cool that it worked.

- I felt like if I could make it work, I had a chance at a more interesting life.

I got to do what my dream was, but I was willing to take whatever opportunity presented itself.

Backup singer, one of the best known backup singers, I'll take it, you know?

Like, wherever I can find.

I just wanted to fit somewhere in a place that fed my passion.

And what I found was that if you know what you enjoy doing and fulfills you more than anything in the world, you can work really, really hard, and you may be tired at the end of it, but you're filled up, too.

And that's what I was looking for.

- I know you're a major social advocate and you've done a lot of work.

I mean, really, you've really went through a period where you were very important to the LBGTQ community during the AIDS crisis and you've spoken out about coal and you've spoken about the environment and just a lot of things.

Aging.

You are host of "Aging Matters."

Why do you do that?

- It's the same process.

I got involved, I didn't, you know, there was a lot of pressure to be like, what's your charity?

You know, and all that when I was young.

And I was like, ah, I just feel a little squeamy about that.

And then I lost a friend to AIDS, and then I lost another friend to AIDS, and then I lost another friend to AIDS, and then I lost another friend to AIDS.

And I finally walked into my manager's office and I'm like, I've gotta do something.

I don't know how to even contribute, but I know that there's people who could use a person like me.

And because I'm in country music, they're not gonna know I'm here.

So there was a night on the CMAs where everybody had been wearing ribbons, red ribbons on all the award shows.

And there had been a meeting and the people on the committee that met decided that they were gonna hand out green ribbons for environmental awareness 'cause there was a lot of environmental stuff going on, too.

And they just said, "That's where we're gonna plant our flag."

And I got someone in the newspaper who wrote in the entertainment section, said, you know, "If Mattea gets a microphone, let's hope she says something," basically.

'Cause I had said I was gonna wear a green ribbon and I was gonna wear a red ribbon.

And so I was challenged publicly to speak.

I don't know if I would have found it in me to...

I'm always scared of grandstanding.

And so I don't know if I would've found it in me.

But what I did that night was I felt so much pressure, you know, about which way I was gonna go.

And I can remember my manager and my tour manager standing backstage with me, like, "What's gonna happen, John?"

And I just was like, "I don't know, I don't know."

And I went backstage into the hee-haw set at the Opry House.

I went to the cornfield and the bleachers and I just was like.

And I just searched my heart and my gut and I was like, oh, okay.

It was a commercial.

And I walked back out and they walked me on the stage and I thought, I just said the names of my friends who died and that I had a ribbon on for each one of them and that the green ribbon was for environmental awareness.

And then I read the names of the nominees.

It was a moment in my life where I crossed a line.

But, again, it was an internal process, you know?

Just listening for that quiet voice that points.

- Did you pay for that?

- Well, it's really interesting.

I'm not stupid enough to think that there weren't people who were like, you know, off-put by it.

But I had the most interesting experience.

For the next two weeks, people would pull me aside and tell me a story.

I realized there was a whole community here in Nashville who had been touched in the country music community and they couldn't talk to each other 'cause they didn't know who was safe.

And I thought, I don't care.

I don't care who was negative.

I can see that I maybe helped open up conversation for people who were in pain.

And that was enough for them at that moment.

- You are so authentic.

I mean, if people see you on stage, you are that person.

- I got so lucky in so many ways.

I had a record label that was the smallest of the major labels.

And they were like, "We really believe in you.

You just take your time."

- [Becky] Wow.

- Like, they gave me two or three albums to find my way.

So I got to make some mistakes and stumble without the big spotlight on me.

I had a manager who was like, "I'm just here to help you find your place."

And I worked with Allen Reynolds, who is, we call him the guru.

And he's one of the great producers.

He's now best known for producing Garth Brooks.

But this was back when, you know, he did Don Williams and Crystal Gale and he was a protege of Cowboy Jack Clement.

- [Becky] Oh wow.

- And he just kept looking at me and saying, "It's the song, pal.

It's just the song."

You find a great song and you sing it honestly and you frame it well and it will not exist in time.

It won't get dated.

It'll still be alive.

And I've gotten to look him in the eye and say, thank you for that advice 'cause I'm living it right now.

Someone came out to see me just two weeks ago and he said, "Oh, you know, I have my girlfriend with me."

And he had come out, we did two shows two nights in a row in the same place in DC.

And he said, "I'm coming tomorrow night."

And the next night, he came and he just came to me and he said, "You know, my wife died, then COVID hit and I didn't know what to do."

And he said, "And then I heard 'Time Passes By Again,'" another song of mine that my husband co-wrote.

And he said, "And I thought, I need to pick up the phone.

And I called this person.

And we've been together ever since."

And you hear stories like that about songs.

If you get lucky enough to do this, you hear the way songs affect people's life.

And to be the steward of that is a privilege.

- Well, I've heard you say, well, actually, I've heard other people tell you how impactful that is.

And you've said it's a blessing to be the soundtrack of somebody's life.

- It is.

It absolutely is.

I mean, you know, if you get to do this, getting to do it is like, oh, oh my gosh, I'm gonna get my shot.

But there is a thing at which it's like, does anyone else resonate with this?

Does this have any meaning for anybody else?

Or is it just me like wanting to be famous, you know?

And so I think on some level, if music moves you enough to dedicate your life to it, you know, you want it to mean something to somebody else.

Like, that's the ultimate fulfillment.

And, you know, to have had that experience is, you know, it's just the sweetest thing.

It feels like I found my life's path early.

- You are a two-time Grammy winner.

You've had multiple songs in number one and in the top 20 and lots of albums.

You know, what are your favorite songs that you've recorded?

And you mentioned, you mentioned the one that your husband wrote.

- Yeah.

"Where Have You Been."

- Yeah.

What a song.

That is a song.

- Yeah.

That's one of those songs.

I mean, that song happened to me and to him and to Don Henry who he wrote it with.

And it's a true story about John's grandma and the last thing she ever said.

But he would sing it or play it for people and people would just, like, he played it for his publisher.

And he said, she was like standing in the room, in his writing room.

And when it was over, she just slid down the door.

She just slid down the door and onto the floor sobbing.

I didn't really believe this in the beginning.

I knew the story so well, so I was not as gobsmacked by it.

I saw him sing it at the Bluebird and I watched what happened in the audience and I was like, I'm too close to him to be able to see this objectively and this song needs to be heard.

♪ Where have you been ♪ ♪ I've looked for you forever and a day ♪ ♪ Where have you been ♪ ♪ I'm just not myself when you're away ♪ It was just such a gift, such a gift that keeps on giving.

- So, you know, the premise of this show, it's called "Clean Slate."

So whether it's professionally or personally or for your community, what would you do with a clean slate?

- Probably the same darn thing I'm doing right now.

And I'll just say, for me, I think what I was really lucky to have happened to me young was I hit this fork in the road when I was in college and I realized that I felt different when I was doing music than when I was doing math and science.

And I was good at math and science and I was good at music.

And I thought, you know, I think I would rather quit school and move to Nashville.

And even if even if I don't make it and I don't have a life in music, I will always know.

And so when I talk to the college students from Berkeley, they come to town every year, and I just am like, do you wanna know the truth more than you wanna not hurt?

I thought, if I get a no, at least I won't be wondering for the rest of my life what would've happened.

If I get a yes, I get this great life, this very interesting life.

And so I think I would probably be in the same, I've been in the same process ever since.

And I think I would probably be, you know, living into the same questions.

'Cause they're the ones that point me to where my compass is deep inside.

- What's a number one question you ask yourself when you get offered a new project?

- Does this line up with my values?

Does this line up with what I wanna see more of in the world?

- So, you're doing some really exciting things now.

What's the most exciting thing?

You have taken on a radio show.

- Yes.

I host an NPR radio show.

Public media again.

There's a public radio show outta my hometown called "Mountain Stage" out of Charleston, West Virginia.

And it started in 1983, which is the year I signed my record deal in Nashville.

- [Becky] Wow.

- So I would go and play on the show from the very beginning.

And every time I'd put out a new record, I tell people, for me, it was like rounding home base, you know?

The host, Larry Gross, who started the show, is getting older and was looking for someone to take over.

And they had me guest host a couple times and they were like, "You kinda get it.

You really get it."

And I thought, yeah, I've been an artist on the show for a long time.

And, again, I'm like, oh, I don't know.

This is gonna be a lot of work.

And I thought, it ticks the boxes of everything that I've, you know, music finding its way, live performance, the culture of West Virginia, not the stereotype, but the actual culture of what it's like to be in West Virginia.

And also, I realized, my whole career has been spent talking about me, me, me, me, me.

And I get to dig into five artists every time we do the show and listen to their music and their story.

And then I get to basically shine a spotlight on 'em.

And I was like, at the end of the day, it's just about love and music.

So like, why would I say no?

It's incredibly fulfilling and it's wonderful to be the facilitator of something with that many moving parts and to hold the history of it and to keep something going that everyone thought would be done once the founders were all gone and moved out.

So I feel like my goal is to take the baton and pass it on to someone else so this thing can go on long after I'm not here anymore.

(audience cheering) Thank you, thank you.

Hello, and welcome once again to "Mountain Stage," live performance radio from the mountain state of West Virginia.

- You've been so great as our host for "Aging Matters," a series here on Nashville Public Television.

You recently did a short that was really impactful about how challenging it's been.

As you get older, your voice changes.

And you've worked through that.

How has that experience been for you?

- Oh, hosting "Aging Matters" was a no brainer.

Again, it checks the boxes for all the things that I think are important.

I was so proud.

This thing's been going on for how many years now?

- [Becky] A bit.

- Over a decade.

And I thought my hometown public television station is doing a service project for our community and beyond on the Baby Boomers aging and what that's going to mean for all of us as this bubble moves over into retirement and beyond and made it available on a platform for anyone who wants to see it.

And so they said, "Would you host it?"

And I'm like, well, yeah, of course.

Just to be able to contribute from my personal life as well as, you know, to be able to host was unexpected.

- Well, you are a gift.

You are such a gift.

Is there anything I didn't ask you that you wish I had?

- And thank you.

No.

I think of myself as an expatriated West Virginian.

I feel like I'm a Nashvillian and a West Virginian both at the same time.

And I've watched public television since I moved here.

I remember of my early jobs here was in an office with no windows, alone most of the day.

And I discovered public radio.

And I've been sustained and filled and enriched by public media.

And so the chance to get to participate and give back and be part of it helps steer the, you know, help have a little tiny voice unsteering the ship has been wonderful, wonderful for me.

- Well, it's wonderful for us.

Thank you, friend.

- Thank you, Becky.

I really enjoyed it.

And, you know, I love MPT and I'm glad to be able to be part of it.

- Me too.

♪ We've thrown away the compass ♪ ♪ Done with the chart ♪ ♪ I'm tired of spinning around ♪ ♪ In one direction ♪ - You know, it just reminds me of what a wonderful love story you have.

I mean, you've met John, that was kind of crazy how you met your husband.

- [Kathy] Oh gosh.

- And then you, you know, it's not always been easy and yet you just persevere.

- Well, we've been married, this year, we were married 35 years.

- [Becky] Wow.

- But I tell people, we're on our third marriage.

We killed the first one, we killed the second one.

It just has the same faces as the first and second marriage and we didn't have to walk through the divorce.

But it's been like, we've hit an impasse a couple of times and looked at each other and said, you know, what do we wanna do here?

Do we wanna walk away?

And there was one time I was like, look, you're the love of my life.

You're gonna be my best friend for the rest of my life.

So maybe what we need to do is you just buy a house around the corner and we'll live two miles from each other and we'll have dinner three nights a week and we'll talk on the phone every day.

Like, you're my best friend, and that's not gonna change.

But every time that we have come to an impasse, which has only been a couple times, we've just looked at each other and just thought, you know, it was so organic in the beginning.

And you have to, especially if you're both creatives, it takes a lot of effort to not be distracted by the muse and lose focus on the coupleship.

And so every time we do that, one or the other of us does that, we sort of call each other back.

(bright guitar music)