This transcript was automatically generated and might contain errors.

[0:39] Daniel Nolen: Hey y'all, today's guest is one of the most distinctive and thrilling voices in modern Broadway history, Linda Eder.

[0:46] Linda Eder: You're here.

[0:47] Ben Rimalower: Linda came to fame winning on Star Search and then leapt to big-time theater when she became the muse of composer Frank Wildhorn, eventually starring in several of his musicals, including on Broadway, Jekyll and Hyde. And early on, Linda's work on stage and on many of her successful albums drew eager comparisons to Barbra Streisand's.

[1:07] Daniel Nolen: It's not hard to see why, given Linda's luscious vocal lines and expansive breath.

[1:12] Ben Rimalower: Yes, and that almost metallic way her head voice can just open up right into her belt with complete lack of vibrato.

[1:19] Daniel Nolen: I live for it.

[1:20] Ben Rimalower: Yes. No surprise then that Linda has chosen to chat with us about My Name is Barbra.

[1:26] Linda Eder: Where do I begin?

[1:28] Ben Rimalower: With that album.

[1:31] Linda Eder: So much to say. Um, but I will say there is um my favorite, one of my favorite recordings of uh Barbra Streisand's is um from her original uh set at the Bonsoir.

[1:48] Daniel Nolen: Which I listen to all the time, as you do.

[1:51] Linda Eder: Shit, Daniel Nolen says. Uh, and there's this. There's uh on one there's two different sets that you can listen to.

[1:57] Ben Rimalower: I did not know this.

[2:00] Linda Eder: Yeah. But there's a really wonderful thing she does where she sings My Name is Barbra straight into Much More from The Fantasticks.

[2:09] Daniel Nolen: Oh it is beautiful.

[2:14] Linda Eder: My mother said that babies come in bottles.

[2:19] Daniel Nolen: But last week she said they grew on special baby bushes.

[3:05] Linda Eder: Where the water is icy cold, then go to town in a golden gown. And my fortune told just one just one.

[3:34] Daniel Nolen: Just one before I move.

[3:46] Linda Eder: But a little worldly wise to be the kind of girl decide to be kissed upon the eyes. But the way the recordings are, the tracks are, it's like, you know, there's like this huge like three-second gap between each track for some reason.

[4:11] Daniel Nolen: Painful.

[4:12] Linda Eder: Yeah. So like I literally have to manually go in and like right as the music comes off, I just switch it to the next track, and it just in that way it follows. Barbara's like, no, no, that's why you can't just play it on iTunes.

[4:22] Ben Rimalower: What you have to do is you have GarageBand on your—do you have an Apple computer?

[4:25] Linda Eder: He's like, Jason told me how to use GarageBand the other day. He's so funny with his technology. Um yeah, so I love that so much.

[4:35] Ben Rimalower: Um I'm gonna get out the old. If we wish we had an intern to do this, but I'm gonna.

[4:40] Daniel Nolen: What did we decide our intern was?

[4:42] Ben Rimalower: Um, some that Broadway Evita twink.

[4:44] Daniel Nolen: Ooh, look what I was looking up.

[4:46] Ben Rimalower: Most recently on Google Images.

[4:48] Daniel Nolen: Mark Henderson photography.

[4:50] Ben Rimalower: Um, I see a lot of ass.

[4:51] Daniel Nolen: Uh-huh.

[4:52] Ben Rimalower: But some also some headshots. It's artistic, you know.

[4:55] Daniel Nolen: Classic, classic New York house.

[4:57] Ben Rimalower: It's headshots and ass.

[4:59] Daniel Nolen: All the same. That fellow in the—oh, they're all wearing wet white t-shirts.

[5:02] Ben Rimalower: Yeah, it's like at one point that was like the hot new trend was photographing men uh wearing no pants, shirts that were wet in pools.

[5:12] Daniel Nolen: We should bring that back for 2020, maybe.

[5:14] Ben Rimalower: Maybe this summer we could get uh one of our photographer friends to uh take fun photos of us in the pool like that.

[5:19] Daniel Nolen: No, we should have white t-shirts uh of Broken Records logo, and then every time we have a hot guy at our house in Fire Island, we should make them get in the pool in the shirt.

[5:28] Ben Rimalower: Yes, totally, totally.

[5:30] Daniel Nolen: Well, let's become like thirst traps slash podcasts.

[5:34] Ben Rimalower: Yes, uh, a thirst cast, a pod, a pod trap.

[5:40] Daniel Nolen: Okay, back to Barbara.

[5:42] Ben Rimalower: We'll be a bodcast.

[5:43] Daniel Nolen: Is that a thing?

[5:44] Ben Rimalower: Somebody needs to do a vodcast.

[5:46] Daniel Nolen: A bottom cast.

[5:47] Ben Rimalower: I think that's been done.

[5:49] Daniel Nolen: Yeah, it's called Don't.

[5:52] Ben Rimalower: Okay, uh My Name is Barbra.

[5:58] Daniel Nolen: Okay, so let's just go through it.

[6:00] Linda Eder: Let's do that.

[6:01] Daniel Nolen: My Name is Barbra, which I love, but mostly.

[6:05] Linda Eder: You have a big asterisk next to that because you don't really enjoy My Name is Barbra when it doesn't go into Much More.

[6:15] Daniel Nolen: Thank you.

[6:16] Linda Eder: Thank you for making me less happy and smarter.

[6:19] Daniel Nolen: Yes, that's what I do.

[6:22] Linda Eder: Uh okay, so the next one is A Kid Again slash I'm Five.

[6:25] Daniel Nolen: Yes, I'm five.

[6:27] Linda Eder: I'm five.

[6:27] Daniel Nolen: All the way the house down.

[6:32] Linda Eder: I'm five. I'm five. I'm a big girl now, I'm five. I can dress myself. I don't need mom to help me anymore.

[6:39] Daniel Nolen: And when I sit in my father's chair, my feet can't reach the floor.

[6:42] Linda Eder: See that? I'm fine. I'm five. I'm a big girl now. I'm fine. My mother doesn't spank me just for going without a hat. She knows how well I'd run away, cause I'm too old for that.

[6:51] Daniel Nolen: What did she think? I'm three.

[6:53] Linda Eder: Not me. What does she think? I'm four. I'm more than four. I'm even more than four on a hey!

[7:04] Daniel Nolen: On April 24th.

[7:05] Linda Eder: I want to hear Molly Pope sing I'm Five, but I want it to be like with like a cigarette and like I want to hear Molly sing it like a like Molly ironically.

[7:15] Daniel Nolen: Yeah.

[7:16] Linda Eder: I feel like I'm Five is um is that song known outside of Barbra Streisand's?

[7:23] Daniel Nolen: No, I think so. All the people that know it, like know it from that.

[7:27] Linda Eder: Oh, is it was it like first recorded by her for her?

[7:30] Daniel Nolen: It's not like a familiar old tune.

[7:33] Linda Eder: It's so amazing how you can just look these things up so it's instantaneously. I'd be at the live It was written by Milton Schaeffer.

[7:43] Daniel Nolen: Um it does not say why it was written, but I feel why was it written?

[7:49] Linda Eder: I feel like it was written. Tell me why.

[7:56] Daniel Nolen: Um okay, so I'm Five, I love it. And then Jenny Rebecca.

[8:03] Linda Eder: I was never that into Jenny. I don't like name songs.

[8:07] Daniel Nolen: Oh me either, unless the name is Barbara.

[8:09] Linda Eder: Um or change to Patty.

[8:11] Daniel Nolen: Um that starts with P and that stands for Patty.

[8:17] Linda Eder: Um, but uh, but also Jenny Rebecca feels like a like it, what's the word? Like it presages, like it foreshadows the like Laura Ashley, like French country estate uh floral Barbra Streisand's of like the 90s through the aughts and teens that we don't like so much.

[8:35] Daniel Nolen: Yeah, totally, totally.

[8:37] Linda Eder: Like you're not Jenny Rebecca. You're like your Barbara Jennifer. And your real name's probably like Gittle Simcha or something.

[8:44] Daniel Nolen: Jenny Rebecca.

[8:46] Linda Eder: I wish she'd named her dog that.

[8:47] Daniel Nolen: Well, I'm sure she has plenty more in the freezer.

[8:49] Linda Eder: She couldn't once coming out. Okay. Next is My Paw, which I don't really even know.

[8:55] Daniel Nolen: Um, Sweet Zoo, hate it.

[8:57] Linda Eder: Wait, which one is Sweet Zoo?

[8:59] Daniel Nolen: Someone that like the elephants, the elephants, the dinner.

[9:02] Linda Eder: Oh no, I'm I think I'm starting to mix up the whole circus thing from Color Me Barbra.

[9:06] Daniel Nolen: Yeah, and all these songs are like literally a minute 30, so yeah.

[9:10] Linda Eder: So it's really a medley just broken. Where is the wonder though? Where's the wonder?

[9:14] Daniel Nolen: I love.

[9:12] Linda Eder: Where is the wonder that I want to want a sky of blue turn walk?

[9:31] Daniel Nolen: Where is the magic that brand me so watching flowers grow in the spring?

[9:45] Linda Eder: Where is the magic that feel the sky? How did Robins fly and see where are the marbles that I marbled at? What changed a kitten to a cat?

[10:06] Daniel Nolen: The end is My Man, of course.

[10:07] Linda Eder: So there's a lot. I got no strings from Pinocchio.

[10:10] Daniel Nolen: Yes, that is one of Barbara's great, great recordings.

[10:14] Linda Eder: I got no strings, so I have found that. I'm not tied to anyone. I love my liberty. There are no strings on me.

[10:30] Daniel Nolen: No task to find me. It's not easy to find me.

[10:49] Linda Eder: Someone to watch over me, which I don't quite remember that one.

[10:53] Daniel Nolen: Um, Why Did I Choose You and If You Were the Only Boy in the World? Okay, who do you associate those two songs with besides Barbara?

[11:02] Linda Eder: Why Did I Choose You and If You Were the Only Boy in the World? It's like why did I choose—this is not right, but I'm thinking of Barbara Cook doing it.

[11:05] Daniel Nolen: Okay, yes.

[11:05] Linda Eder: Why Did I Choose You? Something like that. And then If You're the Only Boy in the World, I 100% think of Bernadette, even though I know that it's actually like a lot of people.

[11:21] Daniel Nolen: You know who I think of is uh Rihanna? Because it's like if you make fan of how we only girl in the world.

[11:29] Linda Eder: How about Barbara's take that? If you were the only boy in the world.

[11:34] Daniel Nolen: But that's girl in the world. You make me feel like I'm the only girl in the world.

[11:37] Linda Eder: Yeah, I know, but I'm just saying, like, that's what I when I see this title, that's what I think of.

[11:41] Daniel Nolen: Gotcha.

[11:42] Linda Eder: Um, I feel it very value cherished when I said that.

[11:46] Daniel Nolen: Yeah.

[11:47] Linda Eder: Jane.

[11:48] Daniel Nolen: I've yeah.

[11:49] Linda Eder: So I was right.

[11:50] Daniel Nolen: So I was right.

[11:51] Linda Eder: I'm right.

[11:52] Daniel Nolen: I'm right.

[11:53] Linda Eder: I'm right.

[11:54] Daniel Nolen: It's Lena.

[11:55] Linda Eder: Yeah, exactly.

[11:55] Daniel Nolen: Yeah.

[11:55] Linda Eder: I just took a big journey with The Comeback as you did as well. I mean, what happened for me personally speaking, that like um I had just been going through a lot uh over the last couple months, and I really like wasn't in a space uh to like get into new TV shows. And I was able to marathon a couple of shows that I was already into that had new seasons come out to stream, like Mrs. Maisel and The Crown. But I wasn't ready to like start new things, like uh, what is it, like uh uh what's the thing everybody's watching, The De... not The Departed, not Mindhunter, what's the... The Watchmen, you know, or just whatever. But um uh so I was just like watching Friends, um uh and then they ripped it out of my cold dead hands.

Uh and so then I was like, uh, what do I watch? And I randomly, even though I've watched it so many times, start... but it had been a minute. Um, I started watching The Comeback again and just like got sucked in, marathoned the entire series and loved it even more and even more deeply than ever before. Lisa Coudreau is like my new spirit animal. Um, and uh and then I came over a couple, well last week, I guess, and we watched the pilot episode, and then that in turn inspired me to go home and take the full journey again, which I hadn't... I'd only watched both seasons once, like years ago, so this time really, really, really spoke to me. Yeah, I'm uh now that I'm old uh but so what it left me then, I was like, what am I gonna watch now?

And I realized that because I had been watching right before I'd started watching Friends as my comfort TV, I'd been doing Seinfeld and um uh so I decided that Friends is to The Comeback as Seinfeld is to Curb Your Enthusiasm.

[13:47] Ben Rimalower: Yes, yes, that scans. And um, so I am now re-watching Curb, and we were just talking about how like it doesn't start off that strong, but uh you have to like have faith because it eventually gets really good.

[14:00] Linda Eder: Yes, and okay, so speaking of your recent journeys, should we go through the Divo list?

[14:08] Ben Rimalower: Let's do it.

[14:09] Linda Eder: Let's do it. Um well, okay, so the main component of my recent uh journey has been that my um uh within the recovery program and the 12 step programs, I have uh been really leaning hard right now, and I have a new idea of my higher power, which is basically uh Barbara Cook. And I've always loved Barbara Cook.

[14:33] Ben Rimalower: The other Barbara.

[14:36] Linda Eder: Uh the well, Barbara.

[14:38] Ben Rimalower: Barbara.

[14:39] Linda Eder: There's only one Barbara.

[14:41] Ben Rimalower: Um we'll let you decide which one we mean in our...

[14:44] Ben Rimalower: I will never let you decide. Our theme song's about Streisand. But um, but I really uh I've just gotten into Barbara Cook in a new way. The thing is, like I'd always loved Barbara Cook, um, and I fell really in love. I'd left her when I was like in high school and really into musical theater as like just the greatest soprano in musical theater history. You know, I mean you can't touch her in Candide or The Music Man or She Loves Me. And um in college, I got really into uh her cabaret work, um, especially, you know, from the 70s, uh 80s, and that this was in the 90s, and so she was still really, you know, at the peak of it, and I just felt like her voice is so unique, and it really, you know, we talk a lot about these like high belters and stuff, but to me, Barbara Cook is like this soprano whose middle range is basically just high belting.

And like so so I and and and when she goes low uh it's more seamless than it is with Audra McDonald, but similarly to Audra, she really goes low into like a like chest voice with like very like you know, kind of rich chocolatey resonance in her lows. You know, and um so I love that about her, and and in her cabaret career, she really uh perfected the art of using that really expressively, and she talks about well being inspired by Judy Garland in terms of um making a song have like a beginning, middle, and end, like uh like a one-act play. But she talks about being inspired by the great cabaret saloon singer Mabel Mercer, and one of the things she said a lot about Mabel Mercer was how Mabel Mercer uh broke the rules about you have to sing the vowels and just quickly get through the consonants as clearly and quickly and you know painlessly as possible.

But Mabel Mercer broke that rule and leaned on consonants, and and Barbara Cook thought that was so brilliant the way Mabel Mercer did it. She actually says that when Mabel Mercer came to see her, she was embarrassed because she felt like she was just like stealing from Mabel Mercer. But when you listen to Barbara Cook thinking about that, you hear that so much. It's not where you start, it's where you finish. It's not how you go. It's how you land.

[17:50] ♪ Musical number: "A Hundred to One Shot" — performed by Barbara Cook ♪

[18:26] Ben Rimalower: And she just has such a way of just certain syllables and words, just like giving them all this expressiveness by like, you know, she'll be in the middle of a very, very singing, of a very vocally produced vocal line. And just like one syllable or one word, she'll sort of speak outside the um the music. Like just kind of um either on a like falling down, you know, the scale, not the scale, but you know, kind of sliding down on it or even sliding up on it. But it'll just sound more like a sigh or like a it just gives it this extra expressive intonation. Yes. So um, I got really obsessed with that stuff in college, and um I didn't get to see her. There was one time we were supposed to go, me and my friend Danny Codmer, and we wound up not being able to get to the venue in time.

We missed the show. I was so mad at him. Um, and uh the first time I saw her live then was after they had done the Sondheim celebration uh at the or the Sondheim, what was it called? I think it was called the Sondheim Celebration at the Kennedy Center in like 2002, where they did this like festival of like these little productions of all his musicals with a lot of big stars. It's when Brian Stokes Mitchell and Christine Baranski did Sweeney Todd, and um Raul Esparza and Melissa Errico did in the park with George, and there was all these great productions. It was Judith Light was in Company, uh and that was with John Barrowman. It was a great, and so then they did one night only at Avery Fisher Hall in New York City with the New York Philharmonic highlights from that.

And one of the things in the Kennedy Center Sondheim uh celebration had been Barbara Cook doing her one woman show that she had premiered at Carnegie Hall, mostly Sondheim, which was based on this New York Times magazine article interview with him, where he had talked about not only uh the songs of his that he was most proud of, but songs by other people that he wished he had written. Uh-huh. And so Barbara and her brilliant uh three decades-long collaborator, and who in some ways was responsible for reinventing her as this cabaret singer in the mid-70s, the great, great musical director and composer and arranger Wally Harper. Uh Wally had the idea of them doing this show mostly Sondheim, that was Sondheim songs, but also uh the songs that he had said he wished he'd written, which coincidentally included a couple that Barbara herself had introduced.

Um and uh so this was a big thing at Carnegie Hall. It became one of her best selling albums, and she toured it all over the world. It was even yet another new height of her success. And so they did that in the Sondheim thing. So they did two songs from that at this Avery Fisher Hall that I attended. And um, it was like Anyone Can Whistle and Losing My Mind. And I sat there in my dumbass 26 or 27-year old mind being like, you know, she doesn't really like hold the notes as long as she used to. And really what I love about her is her voice. So I'm just editing the Barbara Cook description in the Wikipedia of my brain to be like no longer as good, not worth my time. Oh no. And so I had all these wonderful opportunities to see these major concerts and cabaret engagements that she did over the next few years that I didn't go to.

I mean, in fairness, you know, I didn't have a lot of money and tickets were expensive, etc. But I didn't go. And then finally, a few years later, um, I got invited. Uh like I got to see her at the Car lot at uh sorry, at Feinstein's at the Regency. Um, but I was like so drunk, I barely remember it, except like going over to Betty Buckley and being like, I know you're a fan of her, so that's like really good to see you here. And she was sort of like, thank you. And um, and then like I saw her in Sondheim on Sondheim on Broadway. Um, and I'd sort of been like, well, she's one of the greats. Um, but I had but I didn't really think her current work at that time was that important to me. Right. And then when her book came out, I read it and I loved it.

I loved reading about her getting sober and everything, and I was thrilled when she got the Kennedy Center honor. And they had, I mean, I think maybe one of my favorite of all the Kennedy Center honors tributes they've done was the one to her, which was with Patti and Audra and Sutton Foster and Rebecca Luker and Kelly O'Hara and Laura Osnes and um what's that woman? Not Meryl Streep, but um doesn't matter. Um Glenn Close. Don't remember. Um, and uh anyway, so that uh that was all wonderful, and then and then you know, sadly she passed away. Um, but so recently I've gotten so much back into her, and I've like re-read her book twice, and what I've actually realized is that I'm a fucking idiot.

That actually when she got into her 80s and her ability to hold notes did diminish a little bit, mind you, still really great, and maybe she lost some of her upper register, a little bit, mind you, still hitting like G's, like, and I think even still B flats. Um I mean like but oh no, Mr. Rimalower must have a C natural or he's not coming. But uh she actually became even more genius at being expressive and moving and singing just with like truth and feeling and just all of humanity, and so now I'm listening to every single thing she ever recorded and the bootlegs, and I'm just so deep into it. So something major has now shifted, which is that I have made, I don't know if we've ever referred to it on the pod before, but I have a personal diva ranking.

Yes, yes. Um, and I won't go into great detail except that number one is Judy Garland and number two is Patti LuPone, which is the way it's been for a very long time, as long as it's existed. And um, you know, people will often say to me, Ben, and I'll be like, what? And they'll be like, Can I ask you something? And I'll be like, sure. You know, and like they'll be like, Patti's not number one, what? You know, and they try to start up with me, but I'm like, no, Patti's Jesus, Judy is like the father God. Right, exactly. In Christianity, the Trinity knows. So that all made sense to me, but I have to say, Jesus got bumped to number three because Barbara Cook is the Holy Spirit. Yes! And um She sure is.

So she really is like, and I don't know. Like, like right now, Judy is number one and Barbara Cook is number two, and I guess that's probably the way it will stay. Yeah. But I'm real, real into Barbara Cook right now. And uh the other interesting thing is that um after Patti on the list always came uh Barbra Streisand's and then Liza Minnelli and then Bette Midler. Uh-huh. And um due to our experiences this uh last summer where I really leaned in hard on Bette. Same, I have now raised Bette up above Liza and Barbara. So crazy. And um it's so crazy because I actually went through a kind of hating on Bette phase a couple years ago. I mean, Hello, Dolly! really like threw me full throttle back into love.

Right. Right. And Bette's albums I've always loved and they are my like life, you know. Yeah. But um I really didn't like her. It started when she was on Kathy Griffin, the on my life on the D list. We're going back now quite a few years. I watched that a long time ago. I used to love that show. And I remember like falling in love with Cher when she was on that show. And like, you know, Kathy would just be like her like eccentric, uh lovable, crazy, you know, self, and Cher is just like Kathleen, you're crazy cook. Yeah, yeah. You know, whatever. I mean, Cher, you know, Kathy could be like, Cher, like, you know, gay guys are so obsessed with you. Do you ever let them like clean your toilet or like go through your trash?

Or do you ever like make them your slave? And she'd be like, oh shut up, Kathleen. Right, right. You know, it was just like all in good spirit. Yeah. Whereas when she had Bette Midler on, Bette was like appearing in Vegas. I think it's when she was doing the show Girl Must Go On. And like they were like having lunch or like dinner or something. And like not having it. Bette was very much like not happy with the water that the restaurant served, and like just like it reminded me of like Barbara in the 90s. Yeah. Which, first of all, I mean, Barbara's Barbara, and like I'm happy to say, in these modern eras that we're in now, Barbara is a little less like that than she used to be. But also, like, she's Barbara, like lover or hater, that's kind of part of her thing.

That's what she's known. But you really want Bette to be like with her tits hanging out, like at the bathhouse. Like, not you don't want her to be complaining about like the water. Right. Right. And like, so I really didn't enjoy that. And she was like kind of weird and like not rolling with it with Kathy. But I kind of like got over that because like it's the art, not the artist, you know. But then when she was in that play, I'll Eat You Last on Broadway. Maybe my expectations were too high because like I love that movie that Steven Sondheim co-wrote. Um it takes place on the uh the yacht. What's it uh The Last of Sheila? Okay. Have you ever seen it? Oh my god, you need to watch it. No, no, no. It's but it's it takes place in the 70s, it's in the 70s, takes place in the 70s on this yacht, and Diane Cannon, who I'm so obsessed with from this movie, plays this character very much based on Camers, yeah.

And it's amazing. You will like become a Diane Cannon queen like instantaneously. So I was like, if Diane Cannon could do that, just imagine what Bette Midler can do. You know. Um but I did not feel that way. I felt like the whole play, Bette was like wishing that she had like a glass shield protecting her from like the audience's germs, you know. I just did not enjoy it. I I felt that there was something uh alienating and like standoffish and ungenerous about her energy, and um I don't know. I I so you know, my and my my best friend Marissa kept being like, You have a weird thing about Bette. That's like not about Bette, that's about your mother. And I was like, okay, thank you, like pop psychology 101, slash like fuck you, mom.

But no, I love you, mommy. But like, doesn't matter, she doesn't listen. But um, but anyways, that's where I was. So I I tried to take my own feelings with a grain of salt. Feelings are not facts, but I also was like not that psyched about Bette Midler. Um, and then Hello, Dolly! I thought she was like the greatest Broadway performance. And as much as I wish to God it was Patti, I kind of felt like Patti couldn't have had the triumph that Bette had for various reasons, most of which were nothing to do with talent, but still such a star. At the end of the day, bottom line, net net, it had to be Bette. Um nothing but net, nothing. But that said, having nothing to do with that, my real true, and we might have talked about this on the pod before.

My true intellectual appreciation of the superiority of Bette came with the standard for all we know. Yeah, not to be confused with our favorite Shirley Bassey, Karen Carpenter, Carol Burnett song, for all we know. Um this is the for all we know from the From the Boys soundtrack. Yeah, well, and I originally knew the boys from the Barbra Streisand's the concert album where it's like her from 93 or whatever, where it's like her final envelope. It's useless. I mean, she might as well be singing like I mean, in fairness to Barbara, although also in critique of her choice, it's not that amazing of a song.

[29:30] Ben Rimalower: Like if you're gonna have a beer final, it's not she acts like it's like it had to be you, or like you know, um, the way you look tonight, or some just like perfect timeless classic standard that has like universal appeal, yeah, you know, but it isn't that, it really isn't that.

[29:48] Daniel Nolen: And she sings it as if it were that and bringing nothing to it, and it gets nothing from it, and it's usually ring every trapping out dead trap.

[29:58] Linda Eder: Oh we know this may only be a dream.

[30:10] Ben Rimalower: We come ahead, we go like a ripple on a stream.

[30:23] Daniel Nolen: So love me tonight.

[30:41] Ben Rimalower: For all we know. And I was shocked when I came across, and I realized that that was the song on Bette Midler's For the Boys soundtrack, which is basically a solo album. Because Bette does actually what I'm kind of talking about, Barbara Cook doing, although if you're talking about this alone, of like leaning into the phrasing, Bette actually does this better, maybe than anybody.

[31:04] Daniel Nolen: I mean, in fairness, it's kind of all she has for the most part, but she has it in spades.

[31:10] Ben Rimalower: Yes. And when she and it's part of why she's so great at doing this sort of like period piece kind of numbers, because she really leans into that on For All We Know, and it's you listen to Bette sing For All We Know, and oh, this is gonna be great to play the Barbra Streisand's version.

[31:25] Daniel Nolen: Yeah, the Bette version.

[31:26] Ben Rimalower: The Bette version is like magical because she makes it she slides into that first, it becomes so evocative.

[31:35] Daniel Nolen: For we may never meet again before you go make this moment sweet again and like it's just it's magical it's transporting in a way that the Barbara one is just absolutely boring and worthless.

[32:10] Ben Rimalower: Um so that said, and then really just like you know, I've always loved Bette's best albums. Her first two albums, The Divine Miss M and her self-titled album Bette Midler. I've always I grew, I mean, even before I really got into like diva solo albums, just in my childhood when it was a number one pop album, the Beaches soundtrack is just like one number one classic rendition after another.

[32:36] Daniel Nolen: And um, over the years I got really into various uh other Bette Midler albums, like at the time, I guess what were the ones I got into acting?

[32:45] Ben Rimalower: Well, Broken Blossom, which was not successful from the 70s. But I do love Brasil. I really love and have loved for a long time. And when it came out in the 90s, her like 90s like alterna pop album, um uh yeah, Bette of Roses. I was really obsessed with that from the day it came out, you know.

[33:04] Daniel Nolen: And um, and her tribute albums to Rosemary Clooney and Peggy Lee, of course, are great, but they're you know, very genre, if you will.

[33:11] Ben Rimalower: And uh, what am I forgetting? Like, I had loved Bath House Betty, but in a way that was kind of like a genre thing, but I had sort of written off, oh, and I already loved um the For the Boys soundtrack.

[33:23] Daniel Nolen: Sure.

[33:24] Ben Rimalower: And I loved, um, although in a sort of second tier at that time, I loved uh what's the album with From a Distance, Some People's Lives.

[33:31] Daniel Nolen: Yes.

[33:32] Ben Rimalower: But I'd written off her like sort of like less successful disco-y like later 70s album.

[33:37] Daniel Nolen: Thighs and Whispers.

[33:38] Ben Rimalower: Um for the most part Songs for New Depression, except for one or two tracks. And um certainly like Mud Will Be Flung Tonight, uh, which is basically like a comedy album. And like uh No Frills. Like I really had just sort of like written those off.

[33:55] Daniel Nolen: But over the summer, I began to feel journey. I mean, basically, my whole adult life as a diva lover is a journey from being like, I like their early work when they sang show tunes and standards. I do not like when they try to do pop to being like, no, I actually do like when they try to do pop.

[34:12] Ben Rimalower: And um, you know, now just basically the entire Bette catalog, and like do not tell me that Thighs and Whispers is not equal to her greatest albums, because I absolutely love for it. The amount of like just passion and phrasing and specificity and just like musicality that Bette brings to like, you know, cradle days or like first case you gave me.

[34:47] Daniel Nolen: I was not a child your land was so warm to always remember because that was first day we made the made Like my nights in black leather or like hang on in their baby.

[34:47] Ben Rimalower: Hang on in their baby. Oh, you know. I mean, and like, you know, I mean big noise from Winetka, I already enjoyed because I liked when she did it in Live at Last as like a you know, as like an opening number. But actually, it's like just a great piece of music. It's a great track.

[35:36] Daniel Nolen: It's so good, and it's that that track is so fun to walk around the city in the summer too, because like the beat is just the perfect.

[35:45] Ben Rimalower: It's hot, but it's cool.

[35:47] Daniel Nolen: But it's cool.

[35:48] Ben Rimalower: Um it's just like driving, but it's fun.

[35:52] Daniel Nolen: This is the story of a young girl.

[36:07] Ben Rimalower: Big noise to in the wine. Don't eat those heart and things. Big noise who in Fab. Big noise to ride out here. And then of course, I like to cool down.

[36:23] Daniel Nolen: It's driving, but it's chill.

[36:24] Ben Rimalower: Driving, but it's chill. And then, you know, you go to my my night in black leather, um, married man. By the way, hanging but uh driving but chill is a very good uh description of part of what's something so special that Bette can do.

[36:39] Daniel Nolen: Because you imagine her coming out as the opening number doing uh big noise from Winetka.

[36:44] Ben Rimalower: Uh-huh.

[36:44] Daniel Nolen: And you see that she's strutting across the stage. Her little hands. And she's in heels, uh huh-huh. And her hands, her elbows are up and her hands are out, like gay style with like lymphriss. And she's kind of waddling as if she was like a rich lady, like going to like grab like her like iced tea in the backyard. It's very like down down Beverly Hills.

[37:03] Ben Rimalower: Yeah.

[37:03] Daniel Nolen: But it's also fast and on the beat. Like she's doing this waddle that sort of seems like lazy and like hanging out. But it's also very much like two, four, six, eight, go. Come on, girls. Like, there's it's so amazing how she can be.

[37:18] Ben Rimalower: I think it's a mixture of cocaine and quaaludes.

[37:20] Daniel Nolen: Sure, yeah.

[37:21] Ben Rimalower: Um, so I love that. And then I like to cool down with Hang on in their baby, which was like my top play track of last year. It's just like it's it's like seven minutes or something, but it's like I wish it was 14.

[37:32] Daniel Nolen: Yeah, it's just like I never get sick of it. It like really grounds me.

[37:36] Ben Rimalower: Yes.

[37:38] Daniel Nolen: Only a baby. I'm knowing a master of the world.

[37:45] Ben Rimalower: Wow. We can't have my make it. Because there's real love between us all. Well come on, help me back. Then every girl thing so we're almost there in a bar with Julie Megan. Came on in that babe. Came on in the nose. I'm gonna be anymore. Come on in there, babe. Please don't let the go. Please don't destroy this new.

[38:25] Ben Rimalower: Um, that part at the beginning where she's like, um, no, I ain't gonna hurt you. You know, it's just like comforting. It's like, oh. I mean, I love her so much. Nobody can do like stylized like intro dialogue as well as that.

[38:42] Daniel Nolen: Yes, I mean Bette does it so well, and who and the person does it the worst is Barbra Streisand's.

[38:49] Ben Rimalower: As we as you can see on her Hello?

[38:53] Daniel Nolen: Oh, hi.

[38:54] Ben Rimalower: Hello, Jim.

[38:55] Daniel Nolen: What's that?

[38:57] Ben Rimalower: You can't make it? No, of course. Of course I understand. Yeah, yeah. Alright, I'll I'll talk to you later. Yeah. Patrick Wilson. You've got to let me go. I know. Alright, so with all that said.

[39:13] Daniel Nolen: All that said, my diva ranking has changed. Barbara Cook is the Holy Spirit. Bette Midler is now above uh Barbara and Liza and still below Patty.

[39:23] Ben Rimalower: And I think the only difference, I mean, I think mine's a big thing. I guess if Patty's Jesus, Bette would be John the Baptist.

[39:28] Daniel Nolen: Why am I so New Testament?

[39:30] Ben Rimalower: John the Baptist. Thank you. Um I think mine, similar to yours, but I think I mean I know Patty is not your Jesus.

[39:39] Daniel Nolen: Patty's not my Jesus.

[39:41] Ben Rimalower: I think Barbara would have to be my Jesus, and then my Holy Spirit would be like, maybe Bette.

[39:46] Daniel Nolen: Oh, okay.

[39:47] Ben Rimalower: And then John the Baptist would be like Angela Lansbury.

[39:51] Daniel Nolen: Angela Jesus, please.

[39:52] Ben Rimalower: Yeah. And then I don't know who the fifth one would be. The uh who's the fifth one? Like Judas.

[39:59] Daniel Nolen: I I think you have to stop.

[40:00] Ben Rimalower: No, there's oh well, let me see. Who is mine? I'm scared to do like my whole on the thing because like um I don't wanna, you know. Um oh well, after Liza for me comes Elaine, then Angela.

[40:14] Daniel Nolen: Okay.

[40:14] Ben Rimalower: So I think Elaine is definitely my Judas.

[40:19] Daniel Nolen: Everyone's Judas.

[40:20] Ben Rimalower: She's our own Judas.

[40:22] Daniel Nolen: Okay, okay, so now that we have the diva ranking out of the way.

[40:27] Daniel Nolen: Yeah, let's talk to another diva, the one and only Linda Eder.

[40:33] Ben Rimalower: Broken wreck. Broken wreck. Broken wreck. Um, are we good? Are we recording?

[40:39] Daniel Nolen: Yes, we're we're rolling. We're gonna do a whole uh intro of you when we record the first part of the podcast later on. With so this is just uh hot seat right now with you.

[40:49] Ben Rimalower: We're so excited to have Linda Eder.

[40:51] Daniel Nolen: Yeah much. We had the treat of seeing your show last night here at the Crown Anchor, which is a summertime uh like uh religious occurrence now to come see here in P Town.

[41:02] Linda Eder: Totally.

[41:02] Daniel Nolen: How many years have you been coming here?

[41:04] Linda Eder: A lot. Um, I don't even know. I think gosh, it has to be maybe 15 years or something.

[41:13] Daniel Nolen: Yeah, definitely I mean, definitely every time I've been here I've seen you and it's been fewer than already uh yeah knowing lengths of times of things, but yeah, I've been proud about that.

[41:22] Linda Eder: Well, I mean, and how is it that your voice just gets better every year? I mean, it does not make sense. Like it's fallacy. There should be some I mean other singers have to adapt and adjust, and you know, that's okay, but you just I mean, someone like you was like, what are they restaurant quality? I just want to say it was just as good as the album I listened to in you know 25 years ago. Barbra Streisand's take note.

[41:45] Linda Eder: That's nice to hear because you know, obviously I just feel my age, but that's nice to hear, thank you.

[41:50] Daniel Nolen: But I mean you might is it a technique that you have that keeps you in in such a that pingy amazing sound.

[41:56] Linda Eder: I'm self taught. Um, my influences were Judy Garland and Barbra Streisand's and a classical singer named Eileen Farrell. So uh so I think uh I innately sort of learned some good techniques in trying to emulate people that I really aspire to who had good technique at maybe helped me in the I mean they're great artists but they have they didn't have the vocal uh you know longevity.

[42:20] Ben Rimalower: I mean Barbara still does those tours now Barbara definitely but she doesn't sound the way she did before. I mean you really she's you know 19 years older than me.

[42:27] Linda Eder: That's true. She's older.

[42:29] Ben Rimalower: She's actually singing better now than she was some years ago because she's actually singing more.

[42:33] Linda Eder: Right. Right.

[42:34] Ben Rimalower: She doesn't sing but uh you know she didn't sing uh like a lot of people like Shirley Bassey who sang all the time.

[42:41] Linda Eder: Yeah and she's a little older than Barbara and yet her voice because she's working all the time. It's a muscle it's a muscle that's the only reason though but I think uh I think Barbara's still pretty amazing.

[42:52] Ben Rimalower: She is well and she holds the audience. I mean there's a lot to enjoy about Barbara.

[42:57] Linda Eder: Yeah but by my age she was still singing really really great.

[43:00] Ben Rimalower: Yeah well well so are you I'm not her age yet so I think when she was my age as I am now her voice was still really well I if if you if you are still where Barbara is in 25 years I'll be happy to be sounding you know as good as she is at that age I don't know that I will you know you never know to be honest.

[43:16] Linda Eder: But it it sounds like you haven't changed anything. I mean you just if anything I don't think when I saw you ten years ago the show was as generous of a set with just I mean you just you know and you don't sound at all at the end of the show I don't think you were I think you could have done a late show. You were still in it.

[43:32] Ben Rimalower: Although I drank a little beer late in the show as you noticed I shouldn't have done that.

[43:38] Linda Eder: Um well thank you I'm I'm you know I'm it's great to hear that because those are hard songs I mean those really go up there you know well that you know, I have to do them and I'll always have to do them as long as I can because um I think I'm that's kind of one of the things that I'm known for is being you know able to go from zero to a hundred.

[43:56] Daniel Nolen: Yeah, totally.

[43:56] Linda Eder: And they want that what I call like the fifth gear. Yeah, triple axle. When people know you can do that, if you're not doing that, there's something that you're not giving them that they're used to hearing, so and I, you know, I enjoy I enjoy those big dramatics.

[44:12] Daniel Nolen: Yeah, oh yeah.

[44:13] Ben Rimalower: Oh my god, your voice was made for them. But it is I have to say, when you sang um oh god, what was the Queen's song uh uh Love of My Life Love of My Life, I mean that was so soft and beautiful, and it was just wow, it was crisp it was like butter.

[44:27] Daniel Nolen: Um so well we know that uh Barbra Streisand's was an inspiration to you, obviously. I mean, and people have compared you to her. I think before I even knew who you were when you were first doing Jekyll & Hyde, maybe when you guys first did like the concept album and it was it was like the one that sings like Barbara.

[44:49] Linda Eder: I'm sorry like me.

[44:53] Daniel Nolen: And so be the same would take way and I'd be so like you loved me.

[45:31] Linda Eder: It's funny because all for so much of my career, when I would walk out onto a stage, and then I would start to sing, I would start to hear this sibilance sound.

[45:41] Daniel Nolen: Mm-hmm.

[45:41] Linda Eder: Because they were saying sounds like Streisand. Oh I hear this and I knew that's what they were saying. But you know, I of course have nothing but I've never been anything but completely flattered by that. Um but you know, she is the queen. Um and you know, her fans, some of them get offended, you know, you know, they get to read really. Well, we're both Barbara fans, and we were very happy, you know, but that's because I, you know, I was as big of a fan as anyone else, and truly it's not that I purposely tried to emulate her, it's just that you everybody, you know, we all sing in ways that we just think is good. So in my head, it was just this combination of these women that you know, Garland and Eileen Farrell and Streisand that I listen to. So when I think of what is good, yeah, that's what I hear in my head.

[46:26] Daniel Nolen: Well, you're less alone now, too. I think people have caught up with you. I mean, now if you talk to so many singers, they'll say, Oh, Barbra Streisand's was an inspiration, and you know, they want to sound like her. And certainly I mean, I think uh now there's a generation, all those girls in Wicked, I'm sure that they would point to you as one of their inspirations, you know.

[46:42] Linda Eder: I mean, yeah, although for some reason not a lot of people do sound like her. So I think I was born with uh a mechanism that was able to now sort of naturally create those sounds anyway.

[46:53] Daniel Nolen: Yeah, because otherwise I I think we'd be hearing a lot more people that sound like Barbara.

[46:57] Linda Eder: Yeah, you know, but I definitely hear the Judy, I mean the especially when I'm doing her stuff. But because I'm a bit of a mimic. I you know, obviously I have a mechanism to be able to make different sounds and all that, so I am also a mimic, so I can't help it when I do it.

[47:10] Daniel Nolen: But it's Judy's.

[47:11] Linda Eder: But you but the drama that you bring when you go into like a big crescendo, a key change, uh uh retard, it has that Judy, you know, just goosebumps. I mean, it's even songs that are um could be boring when somebody else sings them. I mean, like losing my mind, I was like, oh my god, like this is really just such an ideal Linda Eder song. I can't believe I thought this was like you know, a period piece before, you know. It's so it's thrilling, and and it's um and obviously Judy never sang that, you know. I I think that you bring that in, you know, even if the tone has more of like a this the sweet gloss of like a Barbara, you know, poppy kind of you know very more pleasing sound that we like too.

[47:54] Linda Eder: Well, I think that well, you know, music it's there's so many different elements that get it's all about getting the emotion across, obviously. It's not about know what you're hitting, it's how are you affecting an audience, and um I one of the things that I don't agree with sometimes when I I hear um broader reviewers or whatever, it's always always always about lyric, lyric, lyric, lyric, lyric. Well, okay, great. You are telling a story, but it's not a play. You also have an element of music, and music on its own can also create that emotion. Just think of a violinism that doesn't have lyrics, but it's able to be an emotion. So you have to you have to be able to do both.

[48:31] Daniel Nolen: It's important that you're saying that too, because I think you know, uh, it became the trend, I think. Maybe it's because of song time and everything, and it was a lyric focus. And a lot of singers, theater singers talk about being driven by the lyrics and well, that's also because they're not not everybody is a musician. I'm a musician.

[48:48] Linda Eder: But that but it is music. I mean, we that's why it's nice to hear you. There are a lot of actors who sing on Broadway, but they're you know, you know the ones who are musicians because they're also been bringing the element of the music into it in a way that a musician would. And that to me, that's the best musical performers. Both, and it seems that to me that you should be required to be both, but that's not usually well.

[49:08] Daniel Nolen: But I think you know, if people understood that better and focused on that, there would some I certainly cause some performers I think probably are driven by the music and are not encouraged to focus on that or to nurture that. And it's a shame because you know it really it really pays off to work.

[49:27] Linda Eder: And I've definitely gotten better. Um I would I could I could be criticized in my early career being more about the vocal ease and the gymnastics and the sound of the and the musicality of it and not always the lyrics, but and that I I don't necessarily disagree and I because that's one of the things that I feel that I continue to improve on over the years, that I that I am becoming more musical, you know, in but also better at uh interpreting lyric just because I've lived more, you know, and I understand the lyrics more or I didn't understand them as much when I was younger.

[49:58] Daniel Nolen: So well, I think it always seems to me like people are trying to get to the same place and they just have different, you know, ways of understanding the the road, the road to get there. But I'm I'm curious, like for you, like growing up listening to Barbra Streisand's, was were you thinking I want to be on Broadway, I want to be in a star is born and the way we were, I just want to record the records. What was it that you were sort of casting yourself in?

[50:24] Linda Eder: Well, as a kid, I just I wanted to sing, yeah basically. So it was just to have an audience wherever the whatever that meant and wherever that meant. I don't think I necessarily thought about being on Broadway or being, you know, in in movies or anything. I just wanted to sing.

[50:37] Daniel Nolen: Um and did people like your parents and teachers, did they recognize that talent in you and nurture?

[50:42] Linda Eder: Well, I never sang in front of anybody. I was really shy about singing, so I was singing all the time, but I was always singing in private. And then of course to get into choir in high school, I had to squeak out a few notes, you know, and at like junior high was the first time I got into choir. We called it junior high back then.

[50:58] Daniel Nolen: Kidding that usually.

[51:01] Linda Eder: What is it?

[51:03] Daniel Nolen: It was still junior high when I went.

[51:04] Linda Eder: Yeah, yeah. So you had to sing, you know, a few notes, and then I got into and then in choir again we had to sing, you know, like God bless America or something, and it was the most horrific thing for me to do to stand up there and sing.

[51:14] Daniel Nolen: Were you embarrassed or shy because singing to me is it's very personal.

[51:19] Linda Eder: Yeah.

[51:19] Daniel Nolen: Yeah.

[51:20] Linda Eder: And I, you know, to me, it is bearing a part of myself. So as a shyer, not not painfully shy, but as a more shy person, that was that was hard for me. Because it was never a learned thing. That that's also the difference, I think. Sometimes people just learn the craft. But it's not coming from an innate, you know, yeah, innate place.

[51:41] Daniel Nolen: Right.

[51:41] Linda Eder: And with me it always was. I always felt immediate connection to the music and to whatever lyric I was singing. It always felt connected in here.

[51:49] Daniel Nolen: And so it made me shy.

[51:51] Linda Eder: And and I I don't I've never been one of these performers that has just tons of confidence. You know, you're gonna love me, you know. I've never been that way. I I look at people like that, I'm just amazed by it, because that's not me at all. I still to this day I feel like I'm you know, it's all smoke and mirrors.

[52:06] Daniel Nolen: You know, it seems to me like your voice is the voice that everyone like wishes that they had. I think it's just so powerful and expressive and and beautiful that I don't even know how you could do that without having confidence because it it it's it's such a grand sound, you know.

[52:22] Linda Eder: Oh, I really had very, very, very, very little confidence. I mean, you get confidence, you know. I've been doing this now since I was sure singing professionally now since I was nineteen. So and in the beginning it um I didn't have a following, so when I would walk out, it was there were strangers that I had to try to win over.

[52:39] Daniel Nolen: Yeah.

[52:39] Linda Eder: Now it's usually fans, and I have to try to keep them. You know, you know. That's a very different thing. They give you confidence right off the bat because you know they're there for you. So you start off in a different place, but but not to say every night, you know, I'm like, okay, please let it, you know, please let it be a good show, let my voice be there, and you know, because that what you're saying, it's like um that's very that's part of Barbara's story as well. You know, I think the first time she sang to her friends, she made them turn their backs so they can see her. And because I think this well, it's very obvious for her, it's also very it's totally connected to it. Totally her emotions were core, who she is. And then of course we all know the story. She didn't perform for so many years because she got such bad stage fright.

[53:19] Daniel Nolen: Yeah.

[53:19] Linda Eder: So I mean, some you know, the superstar who's, you know, obviously one of the greatest voices of our world. Like she was just saying just what you're saying.

[53:26] Daniel Nolen: Yeah, and it was probably I I don't know if I ever read this anywhere, but I wouldn't be surprised if it wasn't related to just forgetting lyrics on stage because that is the worst feeling in the world. I mean, you can do it once and you can I'm fairly funny, I can usually make a joke, and you can get by with it one time.

[53:40] Linda Eder: Yeah.

[53:40] Daniel Nolen: In a general audience. I mean if I'm in an all fan in the audience, I could fall down on a stage and they're still gonna, you know, applaud. But you know, if it's a general audience where it's a mix, you know your fans, a lot of new people. You you can only get away with that for some so one time, okay. You make a joke and then you go on.

[53:53] Linda Eder: Right.

[53:56] Daniel Nolen: But if you if it happens repeatedly, then it starts to look unprofessional and and but there is just nothing worse than standing up there and and not having the lyrics.

[54:05] Linda Eder: Right. That's what happened uh, you know, at i at Central Park uh with Barbara, and she went up on lyrics like three or four times, and that's that's she cites that as the reason she didn't perform for somebody. But now I mean she's got the teleprompters, and I don't I don't think that bothers anybody in the audience.

[54:20] Daniel Nolen: I don't know.

[54:20] Linda Eder: Which is probably what brought maybe made it easier for her to come back.

[54:23] Daniel Nolen: Yeah, right.

[54:24] Linda Eder: Yeah.

[54:25] Daniel Nolen: And so I was shocked when you said that the only Broadway show you had done was Jekyll & Hyde. I I thought for sure I knew that.

[54:32] Linda Eder: I've done off Broadway things. Like we've done, I've done a show called uh Svengali that we did in Florida and in Houston.

[54:39] Daniel Nolen: And I thought you had done Scarlet Pimpernel and everyone thinks I did the Scarlet Pimpernel, but I I recorded the you know the concept album.

[54:46] Linda Eder: Yeah, but that must have been the one that I listened to.

[54:48] Daniel Nolen: Yeah, that all was six months after Jekyll.

[54:50] Linda Eder: So I mean I was in Jekyll. I would have loved to do the Scarlet Pimpernel.

[54:54] Daniel Nolen: There was like three versions of Scarlet Pimpernel with different casts, like in the same Broadway run. It was like didn't like another director come in.

[55:01] Linda Eder: And maybe I'm conflating the story, but yeah, actually they well, that was they like revamped it.

[55:06] Daniel Nolen: Yes, they did, yeah.

[55:07] Linda Eder: I think in my mind I was like Linda had to be in there somewhere.

[55:10] Daniel Nolen: He was always done.

[55:11] Linda Eder: Yes. He was here last night.

[55:11] Daniel Nolen: Yes, we saw, we were so excited.

[55:13] Linda Eder: Yeah, and then they had different marguerites would come in.

[55:15] Daniel Nolen: Yeah.

[55:16] Linda Eder: But never you, that's so crazy. Like I would have really liked Ellen. You need a revival with Doug because that would have been great.

[55:22] Daniel Nolen: Yeah.

[55:23] Linda Eder: Well, and and so, but I and then I was like, I can't believe that you were never like in Mamma Mia. They must have tried to get you for that show.

[55:29] Linda Eder: Well, you know, my I was sort of Frank's girl.

[55:34] Daniel Nolen: Uh huh.

[55:35] Linda Eder: And I they wanted me to do Annie Get Your Gun. I think that should have been really good in that role because I am Annie Oakley. And I like that score. I think I could have done very well in that, but you know, I was sort of told not to do it, and I listened and I shouldn't have listened.

[55:53] Daniel Nolen: I think I should have just people didn't want you to be a replacement or whatever.

[55:56] Linda Eder: They're not going to say too much, but you know what I mean. I just I followed the advice, and I I really shouldn't have. Even with good intentions, I think those kind of choices, you know, they're hard. In hindsight, things make sense a certain way, but you know, people want you to stay on a certain course that they think is right.

[56:13] Daniel Nolen: But I think that was a mistake.

[56:14] Linda Eder: Yeah. If I had done that, I think I would be doing more theater. But in some ways I it's okay because you know, I had Jake right after that. And I was already I was thirty-eight when he was born.

[56:24] Daniel Nolen: Yeah.

[56:24] Linda Eder: So and I you know, I feel like I had already done quite a bit of theater just doing the Svengali twice.

[56:30] Daniel Nolen: Sure.

[56:31] Linda Eder: Um Camille Claudel that I did at Goodspeed. And you know, we did the different versions of Jekyll and the year-long tour of Jekyll and workshops. And then I was in the you know, I only meant to do the the workshop production of uh Civil War down in Houston because I like the score. I I wasn't planning ever to do the show, but I but I wanted to be part of that. So I feel like I've done I had done a you know, quite a bit of theater and then I had Jake and because I had done the theater they had done, I knew the time that it took.

[57:01] Daniel Nolen: Yeah, sure.

[57:01] Linda Eder: And I just knew that I wasn't gonna be around. You know and concert stuff yeah is all based on your schedule and you can tailor it to work for your own.

[57:07] Daniel Nolen: Which is why today is that, yeah.

[57:09] Linda Eder: Because I just only do a certain number a year and that at times per year, and then I'm just home and I'm riding my horses and I'm making up for all the lost time that I was off doing concerts traveling. I did so much traveling in that time period and just wasn't home and I wanted to be home so badly and riding my horse because I'm horse crazy and I live uh in North Salem an hour north of Manhattan.

[57:32] Daniel Nolen: Oh beautiful.

[57:32] Linda Eder: Um I just love it, you know, and and you know, I'm realizing I only have so much more time than I can ride, so I'm trying to try to make up for all the time I lost. But you know, Jake has grown up now and like you know, there's still lots of Broadway shows out there.

[57:46] Daniel Nolen: It's all right.

[57:46] Linda Eder: Yeah, but I don't know, it's so hard on your voice. And you know, I want to be able to keep singing when I'm yeah, you know, and I'm a big belter, and I don't really want to be doing that eight times a week.

[57:55] Daniel Nolen: That's right.

[57:56] Linda Eder: It was hard when I was doing it at you know, when I was on Broadway. And I because I want to be a hundred percent when I'm on you're just never quite a hundred percent after you've been doing it for a year, and yeah. I didn't like that. I didn't like that feeling, and I wanted to and uh because I'm not uh like I said, I'm not trained theater singer, I don't mix. I was out there full on belting on my notes. And that's hard on your voice. So but it's what people wanted from me. I couldn't, you know.

[58:21] Daniel Nolen: And that's so crazy that your voices just stayed so healthy this whole time.

[58:24] Linda Eder: Well, it's partly because I haven't overdone it. I think a lot of these bigger acts, Whitney, uh, you know, everybody blames it on the drugs, I blame it on they over toured her. That's how it's you know, she's out there singing the top of her head off. You can't do that on that kind of a touring schedule. And when it's at that level, they make you go, okay, every night, every night, one night off, night, night on, one maybe one night off, yeah. It and it's relentless.

[58:47] Linda Eder: Yeah, and I really believe it was the the slow destruction of her voice that was weighing on her so heavily that drove her into all the other stuff.

[58:55] Linda Eder: That that's just my theory, but I really believe that.

[58:57] Linda Eder: Yeah, because it when you're a singer and your whole core is wrapped up in that, when your voice is not right, everything is off.

[59:04] Linda Eder: Yeah, because it's your identity, it's what you do, and it feels so good.

[59:07] Linda Eder: And when it doesn't work anymore, it feels so it feels watching you, it seems like it feels good, you know.

[59:13] Linda Eder: It's fun when you're you know, you're on the body. There's no sense of like ever you pushing it or forcing it. It feels more like you just like low out into like the waterfall to pour out.

[59:22] Linda Eder: And I was a little more tired last night than it was the first night because it's two nights in a row and you know, it's a little bit different. Uh but it it felt great. I had I had two really good nights, but that's not to say that I haven't had shows where I've you know, been sick or I I've had to do more than you know, three in a row or four, and then I by that fourth night or whatever, you know, I could feel the difference, and I it's not fun when you're not able to play like you want to play.

[59:45] Linda Eder: You have to be more careful and make sure this note's gonna come out okay.

[59:48] Linda Eder: Yeah. And that's a big thing, you know, that really shows and my my manager would sometimes when I was sick or whatever manager say, well can you take a song and I was like that's not it. You don't understand. Taking one out's not gonna help me sing this other one.

[1:00:01] Linda Eder: Right, right, right.

[1:00:03] Linda Eder: Yeah.

[1:00:04] Linda Eder: And I've gone on that was a big mistake too. I've learned now in my life I say no when my gut tells me to say no. I went on one time when I was I had a bad cold chest cold, head cold I went on and by the end of the show I not I couldn't talk. The voice wouldn't come out to talk between the number and my voice went from being a because I'm like a metso soprano that's my main range. I went from being that to being I sounded like Sarah Vaughn at the end of graduation I and then I finally couldn't do the last two songs. And that was damaging my voice. You know it was it was the worst thing I could have done. But again I listened and I went on and I I shouldn't have and that's just mistakes you make when you're younger.

[1:00:42] Linda Eder: But it's amazing that you had to figure that out all yourself and there was never well I was always afraid to say no.

[1:00:48] Linda Eder: Yeah which is stupid. You know you really need to not be afraid when you're you nobody knows you better than yourself and you gotta protect yourself and that's the problem in this business you know when people are making money off of you or whatever they really push you. You know like I was pushed to go on and perform when I was sick on Broadway after the previews we all got sick. You know Broadway shows colds go through the entire class and always happens in previews and I got majorly sick um and they talked me into going on and Emily Skinner was my understudy. She would sing the songs off stage, the big songs, but I don't do the show and sing all the incidents. I was delirious and I mean I was like that was one I I I never should have gone on. You know.

[1:01:28] Linda Eder: I should have said, No, I can't. You know, but you don't you just don't know that you can say no.

[1:01:34] Daniel Nolen: Yeah, well that's the worst pressure too in previews and new Broadway musical and you're the star and it's all on your shoulders. I mean that I don't I wouldn't want to trade that's places with you in that week of your life.

[1:01:45] Linda Eder: And that's another reason why I you know, Broadway is so hard because you are gonna get sick, you know, at times and they always want you to come back much sooner than you should.

[1:01:53] Daniel Nolen: Yeah.

[1:01:55] Daniel Nolen: Do you do any like master classes or any kind of mentoring to pass that kind of doing that years uh some years ago now?

[1:02:01] Linda Eder: I was always asked to give lessons and master classes and then because I'm self-taught I felt like I can't do that. I don't know I don't know what I'm doing. I'm just self-taught and I never would say yes and then finally I said, Okay, I agreed to do a master class and I was scared to death because I thought I don't know even what I'm gonna say. So I go there and the first person got up to sing and I immediately relaxed because I knew exactly. It's like I that's the one thing I will brag about myself. I think I'm a really good teacher, you know, innately a good teacher, and I seem to know exactly what the person needs to sound better and I and I have a very simplistic way of communicating it to them so they get it.

[1:02:38] Linda Eder: Mm-hmm. So I and I I found that I really enjoyed it and I I'm um I I've kind of taken a hiatus because it takes time to do it. But I teach a lot over Skype and I do master classes and yeah, and I actually really like it.

[1:02:51] Daniel Nolen: I'm sure you would be I mean when I think about someone like yourself who has um not only so much skill but that is self-taught that because it's not a pair you're not parroting a term or you know, something that was vomited onto you.

[1:03:07] Linda Eder: It's y that's s you own that knowledge that you have in the way. Plus singing is very difficult, I think, to teach because you can't say this move this particular muscle.

[1:03:17] Daniel Nolen: Yeah.

[1:03:17] Linda Eder: Like in your arm. It's all very intricate, it's all very subtle. I don't think anybody really understands completely what's going on. You know, so much of it is mental as well. You know, it's like not trying to force it, not trying to make it happen, which obviously like I can tell when you sing, it's like it's just so free and effortless, but like that's so hard to do because you're not doing anything.

[1:03:39] Linda Eder: Well the one thing that always blows me away, which I don't understand repeatedly, is when people start to sing, they start to pronounce things weird.

[1:03:47] Daniel Nolen: Yeah, right.

[1:03:48] Linda Eder: And I'm like, What are you doing? That's not the way you talk. Why do you why did you sing? And that has a lot to do with bad lessons and bad teaching and then that kind of old leftover classical type of pseudo-class type of training that comes in. Where they sound really formal all of a sudden. And I don't I don't know why, but that's one thing I get out of right away. Why are you doing that? Because we all relate it's about relating.

[1:04:15] Linda Eder: Yeah. You know, and so everyone knows when something's sounding wrong. We don't talk to each other that way. We don't you know, we don't know.

[1:04:23] Daniel Nolen: I mean, do you um when you see new shows and stuff today, do you think like, oh, you know, that that turns me on, or there are things new writers or new singers that that that you feel excited by that you that make you maybe think about more desire to get back into that on Broadway?

[1:04:42] Linda Eder: Um, to be honest, no, there hasn't been a lot of things on Broadway recently that made me go, Oh, I wanna I'd wanna do that. There are older shows, you know, sometimes I think it would have been fun to play the parts, but Broadway's changed so much. You know, in the shows that are hits are are very different.

[1:04:58] Daniel Nolen: Um Dear Evan Hansen, was that like in your wheelhouse at all?

[1:05:03] Linda Eder: Like Yeah, I mean it's mostly based on if someone if there's music that really touches me emotionally.

[1:05:11] Linda Eder: Yeah, you know, and if a performer can really be musical at the same time, because that's mostly what turns me off on theater. But the music is just not there. And I'm innately first a musician, so I have a difficult time with that.

[1:05:29] Daniel Nolen: Yeah.

[1:05:29] Linda Eder: So I can't I can't I'm not gonna say that I'm a huge I'm not a huge Broadway fan in that regard. I don't just go to everything. I'm very picky about yeah, of course I'm very critical about that's just my nature. There's nothing I won't look at and go, I would do that a little differently.

[1:05:43] Daniel Nolen: Right.

[1:05:44] Linda Eder: That's just me, you know. I'd like to actually direct.

[1:05:47] Daniel Nolen: Really?

[1:05:47] Linda Eder: Yeah.

[1:05:48] Daniel Nolen: Well, I bet I bet you would have you would have a lot of good to bring to that. I mean, you know, it must have after working as many shows as you have and just staying in your lane and watching everybody else either do good work or do bad work. I mean, you're ready to do that, you know.

[1:06:03] Linda Eder: Yeah.

[1:06:04] Linda Eder: Maybe then get begun. Well, I've been in front of audiences so much my entire life, and obviously, you know, you don't just want the theater crowd, you want everybody to love it. You know, and it should always be an expanding art form, and you should people are you know, we're all basically the same. It's just about making us feel something.

[1:06:20] Daniel Nolen: So did you get to see the revival of Jack and Jacqueline Hyde? Was this two years?

[1:06:24] Linda Eder: Oh, yeah.

[1:06:25] Linda Eder: Yeah. You could have been the director of that one, maybe the next time around.

[1:06:31] Linda Eder: Yeah, I I wasn't too happy with that. I I didn't you mean the rock and roll version. I didn't I didn't like the music done that way.

[1:06:37] Linda Eder: Yeah, I don't think it really served the the music. What you know, they tend to do that with a bunch of shows. I saw um they were trying to get the production of Godspell that sounded like rent.

[1:06:46] Daniel Nolen: Yeah.

[1:06:47] Linda Eder: And it's like when they're, you know, the producers, it's very producer-y, I think, when it's like if something works and makes money, then they want to just like carbon copy that. And it's like, no, the people that did it that made it work were inspired. They were doing something original, you know.

[1:07:01] Linda Eder: Yeah, and the music wasn't written to be done in that way. And I think it yeah, I wasn't too too impressed.

[1:07:07] Daniel Nolen: Yeah, yeah, I was I was disappointed too. I mean, I loved their voices, um, and I would like to hear them a lot. I love Deborah. I wanted to hear her sing the songs the way they're she could have done the role for sure originally done. She should have done that because she's a great singer.

[1:07:21] Linda Eder: So, well, you could do Jacqueline Hyde or um any of those shows. I mean, that you have an affinity for. Is there one that you would be more likely to take on directorially?

[1:07:31] Linda Eder: Well, I don't know, because it's just saying this to you now is actually the first time that I've ever had.

[1:07:35] Daniel Nolen: Oh good.

[1:07:36] Linda Eder: Well maybe we're at the uh um yeah, I'd have to think about that, but I can't it it's coming now so much that I'm trying to think of the game. But I know there are several that like I said, anything I've seen, I would I would differ.

[1:07:50] Daniel Nolen: Were you going back to Barbara? Did you love um Funny Girl?

[1:07:52] Linda Eder: Sunset Boulevard is one, but I oh yeah, you mentioned that last night. I mean I could play the part, but I also direct I would direct it.

[1:08:00] Daniel Nolen: Well, but I'm surprised you mentioned how much uh regard you have for Glenn Close and you got to see her originally and then 20 years later. But I mean, that's a great example of a Broadway actor who's not much of a singer.

[1:08:10] Linda Eder: I mean, did you know she's not but she is musical though. She's she is musical. You know, um her voice is good.

[1:08:19] Linda Eder: Yeah, but she but she's also she's a great actress, and she is a musician. And that's why she I liked her versions because she is a musician.

[1:08:27] Daniel Nolen: Yeah.

[1:08:28] Linda Eder: She, she yeah, definitely. She's a musical. And your version of that song last night was story. I mean I always think that there's like um that song, there's kind of like two climaxes that like people have to kind of like choose. It's either I've come home at last or this time will be bigger. And you managed to have them both be the climax. That was so gratifying.

[1:08:49] Linda Eder: Yeah, it's an interesting song, and it you know, it's not that A B A B, you know, C A format. It's uh it's it's its own thing. It's just these repetitive things, but it it works.

[1:09:00] Daniel Nolen: Have you done uh any any Angeloid Weber shows? Or or have you sung more of his well obviously?

[1:09:04] Linda Eder: Well I used to do memory and I don't think I ever. I mean your Don't Cry for Me is also Don't Cry for Magic 2 what you add in that uh all through my wild days. That was when I first started singing.

[1:09:14] Linda Eder: Yeah, it was my version of it back then. That was the way I heard it, and then I s then I actually saw the show and all that. Um and when I decided to bring it back into the show, that's my original arrangement from way back in the show.

[1:09:27] Daniel Nolen: Well, I know because I I had had fan fronts. That's on my cassette that I was talking about. I had friends who knew who knew you were fans going all the way back, and they talked about your don't cry for me, and I never found it. And I was like, I want to hear her sing that, and then I think I saw you 54 below a couple years ago and you did it, and it was like, oh my god, it's exactly like basically.

[1:09:47] Linda Eder: Yeah.

[1:09:48] Linda Eder: Oh, I love it so much. Well, so I was gonna say, did you um grow up watching Funny Girl or uh What's Up Doc? All those old Barbara films.

[1:09:55] Linda Eder: Absolutely, what kind of clear day? Yeah, um and all the TV specials, I'm sure like my biggest.

[1:10:02] Linda Eder: Well, that was great. Also, yeah, it's Barbara is still the f the best ever, you know.

[1:10:05] Linda Eder: Yeah. We loved what did I have that I don't have from Twitter Day. Although that's the Edie Gourmet version.

[1:10:10] Daniel Nolen: Well, you know.

[1:10:11] Linda Eder: Because I wasn't gonna do Streisand's version, and then that that song was on the list, so I started looking around and I found the Edie Gourmet version. I thought, okay, we'll do Tis.

[1:10:18] Daniel Nolen: Well Idie Gourmet is a good I I like a Edie Gourmet repertoire for Linda Eder. That's a very good line.

[1:10:23] Linda Eder: I I Well I'm a I love big band.

[1:10:26] Linda Eder: Yeah. I've always I've always innately had a good swing feel.

[1:10:30] Linda Eder: Mm-hmm. Uh and that's something you ha either have or you don't. And it's so obvious it was someone who's trying to do swing and they don't have that rhythm and they they can't sing that rhythm. That's just I'm I was born swinging, so I love that.

[1:10:42] Linda Eder: I love that stuff. Well that I love that that Judy album of yours because you swing on all that stuff and and a lot of those Frank songs too, like was the Frank and Jack.

[1:10:51] Linda Eder: Yeah. The two of them wrote some just amazing big kind of stuff for me. I w it is too bad that that's not more of a thing unto itself anymore. Like just you know, to hear a string section and just full brass.

[1:11:05] Linda Eder: I mean, you know, it really is a treat, especially with a voice that can Yeah, I mean it'll never go away. It's still around and it'll it'll come back here and there and diff it'll always be out there. But yeah, Michael Bublé was kind of carrying the torch.

[1:11:17] Daniel Nolen: Yeah, right.

[1:11:18] Linda Eder: Right. Mm-hmm. And then uh I guess there really wasn't like a girl.

[1:11:22] Daniel Nolen: No, that's the same thing that's the thing.

[1:11:23] Linda Eder: Yeah. Just always like the female singers better than the men.

[1:11:27] Linda Eder: Well, I love Michael Bublé. Yeah, for sure. He's one of them Sinatra and um but yeah, I I definitely like that kind of music.

[1:11:34] Linda Eder: Mm.

[1:11:35] Linda Eder: Well and last night you have such a like you were on stage and is it a four piece that you play?

[1:11:41] Linda Eder: It's a four piece.

[1:11:42] Daniel Nolen: Four piece.

[1:11:43] Linda Eder: And just the way you interact with them and your energy together, it was so wonderful to watch. And it reminded me of like Barbara being on stage in those T V specials.

[1:11:50] Linda Eder: Yeah, interacting with the band. And they're so good. I mean when you when you do like a bigger thing, like do you just like symphony gigs and stuff?

[1:11:57] Linda Eder: I do, yeah, everything from Symphony. And once in a while I we'll do like a piano. Oh just a few songs. You know, I I don't like to do a whole show with just because I want more variety than that. But yeah, I'll do every um usually it's a four-piece, five piece. Five pieces what I normally do, and then depending on the room. But I'd also do the orchestra gigs.

[1:12:15] Daniel Nolen: Yeah.

[1:12:16] Linda Eder: Well, it's great to have anything here. I mean, a lot of people come to Provincetown, just piano only, and it, you know, it's more interesting.

[1:12:22] Linda Eder: Yeah, yeah. They're all interesting in their own way. You know, sure. Of course, it's a great, but it's like a big elephant you're gonna drag along with you. You don't always have the you know, nimbleness to do whatever you want.

[1:12:32] Linda Eder: Well, and budget wise too, depending on, you know, I mean Oh, I don't well that's they'll they'll bring me in. When you do an orchestra gig, they invite you as their guests.

[1:12:39] Linda Eder: Oh, wonderful paying the orchestra because that would be that's good. That I wouldn't want you to have to pay 72 guys.

[1:12:45] Linda Eder: No. Um but like do you um I'm sorry, what was your musical director's name last night?

[1:12:49] Daniel Nolen: Billy Stein.

[1:12:50] Linda Eder: Billy Stein. Do you do you travel with him and he conducts for you then?

[1:12:54] Linda Eder: That's great. Um, when I do the orchestra gig, yeah, I usually bring my three guys that all the rhythm section comes from.

[1:13:00] Linda Eder: That's too hard to teach.

[1:13:01] Linda Eder: Yeah. You know, the timing is all that for uh an orchestra. And because some of those are tricky.

[1:13:06] Daniel Nolen: Yeah, sure.

[1:13:07] Linda Eder: You can't just do one rehearsal the day of and then expect it to go perfectly, and if the timings of things are messed up, that really is obvious.

[1:13:15] Linda Eder: Yeah, for sure.

[1:13:16] Linda Eder: Oh, see, well, we're learning about how to how the prose that does it.

[1:13:21] Ben Rimalower: What about are there other singers outside of Broadway that that you listen to now?

[1:13:26] Linda Eder: Um, yeah, I listen to you know, a lot of stuff like everybody else. I uh you know, I like country music.

[1:13:33] Linda Eder: Yeah, yeah. I like country pop, which is really kind of today's modern rock.

[1:13:37] Linda Eder: Yeah, country singers do you like.

[1:13:39] Linda Eder: Uh well, I like Lady Antebellum, I like um drawing a blank on all of them now.

[1:13:46] Linda Eder: Um Miranda Lambert.

[1:13:49] Linda Eder: I like Carrie Underwood, but I actually prefer if I was just gonna listen to a whole album, I listen to Miranda Lambert.

[1:13:55] Linda Eder: Um, someone like Carrie, um I'm from Oklahoma, so um, you know, Carrie Underwood is our pride and joy.

[1:14:03] Linda Eder: Yeah.

[1:14:03] Linda Eder: Um and she, you know, she's a country singer, but she has a wonderful belt voice. You know, her voice is so incredible.

[1:14:16] Linda Eder: Lost in the blood and LM Showed.

[1:14:23] Linda Eder: And now I'm strong.

[1:14:29] Linda Eder: There must be Sonic in the world.

[1:14:44] Linda Eder: And um, you know, say what you will about the Sound of Music Live however many years ago, but like she actually did sound wonderful in those songs.

[1:14:51] Daniel Nolen: Yeah, you know.

[1:14:52] Daniel Nolen: Well, a lot of country singers. I mean, maybe that's why as a Broadway fan country is appealing, because so often you get these great, great voices.

[1:15:00] Linda Eder: Well, it's changing so much.

[1:15:01] Linda Eder: They're very R&B a lot of them.

[1:15:03] Daniel Nolen: Yeah, you know, Maren Morris, Kacey Musgraves.

[1:15:06] Linda Eder: Mm-hmm.

[1:15:07] Linda Eder: They're all they're so it's very different than what it used to be.

[1:15:10] Linda Eder: But I really like a lot of I like the songwriting. I like melodic music.

[1:15:15] Daniel Nolen: Yeah.

[1:15:16] Linda Eder: So But I listen to, you know, all kinds of stuff. I love Colbie Caillat, you know.

[1:15:22] Daniel Nolen: Oh yeah.

[1:15:22] Linda Eder: I love Bryan Adams, you know.

[1:19:57] Linda Eder: You know, I love OneRepublic.

[1:19:57] Daniel Nolen: Oh yeah.

[1:19:57] Linda Eder: I love OneRepublic.

[1:19:57] Linda Eder: Um I listen to a wide, wide range of stuff.

[1:19:57] Linda Eder: I love Gavin DeGraw.

[1:19:57] Daniel Nolen: He's like one of my favorites.

[1:19:57] Linda Eder: Oh yeah.

[1:19:57] Linda Eder: I've been his show is amazing.

[1:19:57] Linda Eder: I love I love his show.

[1:19:57] Linda Eder: You know, someone like Barbra, she's like, I don't listen to music ever. You know, I don't really like music, blah blah blah.

[1:19:57] Linda Eder: And so I'm just gonna like whatever. But you are such a fan of singers and musicians and you know that is um so exciting because I can tell you're really like you've done the research and and you're singing songs that you really connect with and care about.

[1:19:57] Linda Eder: And we were saying, you know the first you know four or five songs you sang I was like these are like my dream songs to hear performed at a you know a setting like this.

[1:19:57] Daniel Nolen: I mean that was a very high octane show.

[1:19:57] Daniel Nolen: I mean I have to imagine if it's not like P-Town Summer like there must be you must not always do quite such a show.

[1:19:57] Linda Eder: I mean are you serious that is like first of all it was a generous set.

[1:19:57] Linda Eder: I mean I was like by the end I was like oh I guess she's probably not gonna do oh she did it.

[1:19:57] Linda Eder: I mean it was really uh it's it's kind of astounding like is it longer than most people in this town I feel like it is yeah and um I mean it definitely felt like a lot of bang for the buck.

[1:19:57] Daniel Nolen: I mean I think everybody was pretty thrilled it really I mean it's it's um you know you just keep raising the stakes kind of um and uh I mean we definitely jumped to our feet um does that does have you tried though ever doing something that maybe is a little like I mean you could you could get away with doing a much less taxing evening than you deliver, you know.

[1:19:57] Linda Eder: Well I think I think I'm gonna do a jazz album that's coming in the future because I've got Dave Fink who's just, you know, yeah the most amazing jazz bassist there is.

[1:19:57] Linda Eder: So and I that's one art form and it is an art form.

[1:19:57] Daniel Nolen: Yeah.

[1:19:57] Linda Eder: I didn't appreciate it enough when I was younger.

[1:19:57] Linda Eder: Uh 'cause I but I become better at it over the years and I know I have a there's a lot more in there to explore so I think that's an album, you know, that I'm thinking about doing in the future.

[1:19:57] Linda Eder: And that that would be softer.

[1:19:57] Linda Eder: You could spend more time sitting on a stool in a show like that.

[1:19:57] Daniel Nolen: Yeah.

[1:19:57] Linda Eder: Yeah.

[1:19:57] Linda Eder: Yeah, but like to do like an album of all soft songs.

[1:19:57] Daniel Nolen: Yeah.

[1:19:57] Linda Eder: Yeah, I mean I think there would be but it's like anything.

[1:19:57] Linda Eder: You know, you just can't please everybody.

[1:19:57] Linda Eder: I the biggest revelation I had was the realization that people are so different.

[1:19:57] Linda Eder: I used to think if I really like something that meant that probably the majority of people out there really like to do.

[1:19:57] Linda Eder: And then when you realize that's not true, it's really eye opening but it's also really freeing because then you just realize okay so I just I'll do what I do and then you know don't worry about trying to please everybody because you can't.

[1:19:57] Daniel Nolen: Yeah.

[1:19:57] Linda Eder: So but if you if I if I did like an all quiet album there'd be people that would love that and there'd be like oh this is boring.

[1:19:57] Linda Eder: I want the I want the fifth gear, you know the fifth gear and you and I know that would happen.

[1:19:57] Daniel Nolen: Yeah you know well tell the story you s you mentioned this last night but you was it on your social media that you requested people write in and say what songs you did.

[1:19:57] Linda Eder: Yeah I didn't what I wanted to do.

[1:19:57] Linda Eder: I'd done yeah it was my eighteenth and I just didn't know what songs to pick.

[1:19:57] Linda Eder: So I you know I figured it was a I did that for my Christmas CD as well, the first the second one that I did.

[1:19:57] Linda Eder: Just asking for 'cause I'd already recorded all my favorites that I could think of.

[1:19:57] Linda Eder: So I saw I needed some help.

[1:19:57] Linda Eder: And I thought well let's try that again and it just gets the fans involved and they do.

[1:19:57] Linda Eder: They gave me you know really good ideas.

[1:19:57] Linda Eder: And that way you also know you're doing songs that a lot of people you know there'd be a big majority that would what were the what were the top three?

[1:19:57] Linda Eder: It was uh music that makes me dance.

[1:19:57] Linda Eder: Uh well um as if we never said goodbye was the first choice bring him home bring him home yes yeah oh that was thrilling that was so much and that's the that's a song that um you don't rank on my parade I mean uh um before the parade passes before the the opener um bring him home is is a song that obviously you don't hear many women sing it because it's a male song but um hearing you sing it was so um I've heard other women sing it and we will not mention who but I did not like their versions and but your version was spectacular.

[1:19:57] Linda Eder: So good it always gets me too because I the line about the sun makes me think of my son and I get I get like last night I not the the second night I fought it to not go there second night because the first night again I got started getting all choked up and then it's then it ruins your voice and you don't sing it as good as you want to because I can't cry and sing.

[1:19:57] Linda Eder: The only person I know that could do that was Vikki Carr.

[1:19:57] Linda Eder: I don't know if you know that name I know the name yeah she could cry beautifully and sing at the same time I can't do that.

[1:19:57] Daniel Nolen: But yeah.

[1:19:57] Linda Eder: But like even that I'm like now I'm thinking about that was there must have been they must have been trying to get you in Les Mis when that was running recently the well that's one that yeah many times people have said but they also tried to get me to do Cats when the oh yeah well go around either one of them is going to be real I thought about it but yeah and I just decided no but I love you know I love the song but I thought can I sit around all night and just sit back there and wait to come out and do it.

[1:20:25] Linda Eder: I that's life is too short you know and to have to drive into the city every night and then sit there for that long just to do that one number.

[1:20:33] Linda Eder: Because you know, I so many people in the theater business, they're dreaming of that moment when center stage belt with the big song, but I've had that my whole life.

[1:20:41] Linda Eder: So that wasn't what drew me to theater.

[1:20:43] Linda Eder: What drew me was the fun with everybody and that I like the acting and I like the costumes and just the theater vibe, you know, and the whole having the family and the I laugh so much from doing all these Broadway shows.

[1:20:54] Linda Eder: I love the rehearsal period.

[1:20:55] Linda Eder: I laugh so you know nonstop.

[1:20:59] Linda Eder: And that's the part I miss the most about theater.

[1:21:04] Daniel Nolen: Well, we play a little game with all of our guests, um, where uh we asked them, we give you we'll give you three performers and we see which one you would want to see in Hello Dolly, which one you would want to see in concert, and it's like the game fuck Mary Kill, except it's more Broadway oriented instead of sex.

[1:21:23] Daniel Nolen: Hello Dolly concert or kill.

[1:21:25] Daniel Nolen: Dolly.

[1:21:25] Daniel Nolen: We call it Dolly concert.

[1:21:27] Daniel Nolen: But I I feel like for Linda, maybe it's defin it would be Barbra, Eileen Farrell and Judy Garland.

[1:21:31] Linda Eder: I mean totally that that's already her top, so we're good to go.

[1:21:34] Daniel Nolen: So which would you be your choices for those three?

[1:21:37] Daniel Nolen: To see in in Hello Dolly three of them?

[1:21:40] Linda Eder: Yeah, God.

[1:21:41] Linda Eder: You could choose one for Dolly, one you want to see in concert, like peak career concert, and then one you have unfortunately have to give the act.

[1:21:48] Linda Eder: Oh my god, I don't want to kill any of them, so that's hard.

[1:21:50] Linda Eder: Um well, I've seen Streisand in Hello Dolly.

[1:21:55] Linda Eder: So it wouldn't be that.

[1:21:56] Linda Eder: I'd want to see Judy in Hello Dolly.

[1:21:59] Linda Eder: Yeah, that would be pretty amazing.

[1:22:00] Linda Eder: Um I'd want to see Eileen Farrell in the height of her career.

[1:22:06] Linda Eder: Uh because I've seen Barbra.

[1:22:08] Linda Eder: So and I'm sorry, I have to kill you, Barbra.

[1:22:10] Linda Eder: Sorry, Barb.

[1:22:11] Linda Eder: Sorry, Barbra.

[1:22:12] Daniel Nolen: Well, that was.

[1:22:12] Daniel Nolen: All our fans are really gonna hate me nearby.

[1:22:14] Daniel Nolen: I I think I'm on the same page with you about all three choices.

[1:22:17] Daniel Nolen: So that would be unreal.

[1:22:19] Daniel Nolen: Especially Judy and Dolly.

[1:22:20] Daniel Nolen: I mean, that must have um there that had to be actually I think Jerry Herman has said that he wrote all his music.

[1:22:27] Linda Eder: She would have been fantastic if I for her, yeah, right.

[1:22:30] Linda Eder: So funny and relentless.

[1:22:32] Linda Eder: I love it.

[1:22:32] Linda Eder: You know, I saw uh Betty Buckley on tour.

[1:22:35] Daniel Nolen: Oh, yeah.

[1:22:36] Linda Eder: And so the first time I mean I love Barbra in the movie because it's Barbra and I love her singing, and I you know, she's you can't take your eyes off of her, you know.

[1:22:44] Linda Eder: But I I do understand the criticism of her being in that role.

[1:22:49] Linda Eder: Now, especially now that I've seen Betty Buckley play play the part because for the first time ever I understood the character after watching Betty Buckley play it.

[1:23:00] Daniel Nolen: Well, you know, Betty's leaving now, Caroline Carmela's gonna go in for a little while.

[1:23:04] Linda Eder: But they're gonna actually that was when I when they were gonna they were casting it, and I considered asking my agent to maybe put me in for it.

[1:23:11] Linda Eder: Because people don't the people on Broadway don't know me as uh they don't they only saw me in Jekyll where I didn't really act.

[1:23:19] Linda Eder: You know, I just it came from way in the past, and I just did the same thing I'd always done, and there was really no acting and uh it was Linda doing her cabaret thing.

[1:23:27] Linda Eder: Uh but I think I could play that part, and I'm and I think you would agree.

[1:23:32] Linda Eder: I'm actually quite funny.

[1:23:33] Daniel Nolen: Yeah, yeah, sure.

[1:23:34] Linda Eder: And they don't know that.

[1:23:35] Linda Eder: Yeah, but uh it would have you know it would have had to have gone in and tried to convince them because I think that would actually be a part that I could do.

[1:23:41] Daniel Nolen: Well, listen, first of all, you're not gonna age out of that part.

[1:23:43] Linda Eder: Yeah, and the tour is going strong, so we're gonna keep our we're gonna keep our tour.

[1:23:49] Linda Eder: Our prayers, our prayers focused.

[1:23:50] Linda Eder: I gotta you know, I've I'm such a homebody now.

[1:23:53] Linda Eder: And I I did the Jekyll pre-Broadway tour.

[1:23:55] Linda Eder: We did a week in each city, so we had an opening night every week.

[1:23:58] Linda Eder: We traveled on our day off.

[1:24:00] Linda Eder: You know, and that was kind of like my college because I never went to college.

[1:24:03] Linda Eder: And I could do it at that age and I had the time of my life, but to do that again at the now, yeah, that would be really hard.

[1:24:09] Daniel Nolen: Yeah, but you'd probably have um like a what do you call it, like a a better, better contract writer this time around.

[1:24:15] Linda Eder: You still gotta be in the place.

[1:24:17] Linda Eder: Of course they sit down in the cities.

[1:24:18] Linda Eder: This we did the pre-Broadway tour, so we were literally only one week in each city.

[1:24:23] Linda Eder: So you come to Provincetown every summer and people come to see you and it's you know, people come, you know, we know we're gonna see Linda.

[1:24:30] Daniel Nolen: Do you have any other cities you go to at the same time each year?

[1:24:33] Daniel Nolen: Or what's your year like as far as touring and performing?

[1:24:37] Linda Eder: No, not ones that were a specific city where I'm known for being at a certain time.

[1:24:41] Linda Eder: Except you know what a lot of times in the winter I'm in Florida, obviously.

[1:24:43] Linda Eder: But you do gigs at still at 54 Below.

[1:24:46] Linda Eder: Yeah, that I would say that's pretty much the the only other than you know, P-Town where it's sort of it's fifty-four below, which it's the intimate intimateness of the rooms.

[1:24:54] Daniel Nolen: You know where do you play in LA?

[1:24:56] Linda Eder: Well, I'm gonna I'm just gonna go out there uh in a few weeks to go to uh that's gonna not September, but Ur yeah, it is September, Irvine.

[1:25:04] Daniel Nolen: Oh, cool.

[1:25:05] Linda Eder: Yeah.

[1:25:05] Linda Eder: Exactly.

[1:25:07] Linda Eder: So no, there's not any certain times of year that I'm at specific places like people can look on your website if we have ten minutes and all that and follow you on all the socials.

[1:25:17] Linda Eder: There's great Linda Eder content.

[1:25:19] Linda Eder: They can be part of the voting process maybe on your next album or anything.

[1:25:22] Linda Eder: If they really want to know me, they can buy my DVD of my behind the scenes of my life that I made.

[1:25:26] Daniel Nolen: Oh wow and scenes.

[1:25:28] Linda Eder: Well, yeah, I bought well you know everyone puts I do I I am trying to develop uh my YouTube channel because I just haven't and you know, I so I'll be the oldest blogger or vlogger there is.

[1:25:38] Linda Eder: But it's really hard because you have to constantly put one up there.

[1:25:41] Linda Eder: And it takes so much time editing and all that, which I really enjoy, but I had bought one of these phone things you stick on your windshield so I could put my phone on it.

[1:25:49] Linda Eder: Uh and I was going to the grocery store and I just hit the camera and I started filming myself to go in the grocery store because I wanted to experiment with m uh editing in iMovie, which I had never done.

[1:25:59] Linda Eder: I thought this is kind of fun.

[1:26:01] Linda Eder: So I filmed a little more the next day and I was learning how to put it all together.

[1:26:03] Linda Eder: And I thought, you know what? I'm gonna make a DVD.

[1:26:06] Linda Eder: So I spent three years collecting clips of my life, going, taking it with me to my shows, being down at my horses.

[1:26:13] Linda Eder: My life, basically, a lot of my life, over a three-year period.

[1:26:17] Linda Eder: It's like three hours long.

[1:26:18] Linda Eder: And I also made three music videos in it of my three country songs that I wrote.

[1:26:23] Daniel Nolen: Oh, amazing.

[1:26:27] Linda Eder: Oh, so I took three of them and made like videos within it.

[1:26:31] Linda Eder: And so people can get the DVD.

[1:26:32] Linda Eder: Is it streaming?

[1:26:33] Linda Eder: Yeah, it's for sale.

[1:26:33] Linda Eder: It's one of my items that's for sale.

[1:26:35] Linda Eder: I have it after my shows, and don't I don't make any of my music available for download.

[1:26:39] Linda Eder: The last four albums I've done, you can only buy them on my website, the physical CD or the CD at my shows.

[1:26:45] Linda Eder: I don't put everyone.

[1:26:46] Linda Eder: It's old school.

[1:26:47] Linda Eder: Yeah, I won't do it.

[1:26:48] Daniel Nolen: I bet I'm dying to see that DVD.

[1:26:49] Linda Eder: Yeah, and then I made the DVD.

[1:26:51] Linda Eder: So and I tell people you're either you're either gonna be absolutely you're bored out of your mind or completely fascinated, depending on how big of a fan you are.

[1:27:00] Daniel Nolen: Amazing.

[1:27:00] Linda Eder: And I love that man stuff anyway.

[1:27:02] Linda Eder: It's like the behind the scenes whole thing.

[1:27:04] Daniel Nolen: It is totally behind the scenes.

[1:27:05] Linda Eder: Yeah, absolutely.

[1:27:06] Daniel Nolen: Well, we live for you.

[1:27:07] Linda Eder: You're still in England.

[1:27:11] Daniel Nolen: You're welcome to join this.

[1:27:16] Daniel Nolen: Thanks for listening to Ben Rimalower's Broken Records on Broadway World.

[1:27:20] Daniel Nolen: For more episodes, visit Broadway World, iTunes, Stitcher, or wherever podcasts do be.

[1:27:26] Daniel Nolen: Come back next week as we continue our special winter in a summer town mini-season featuring the most fabulous talents from Provincetown and Fire Island.

[1:27:33] Daniel Nolen: Next up, the legendary Jeffrey Roberson, aka Varla Jean Merman, coming in to talk about the original cast album of the Mad Show.

[1:27:41] Daniel Nolen: And after Varla, we'll be chatting with four-time Tony nominee Judy Kuhn and drag icon Miss Richfield 1981.

[1:27:48] Daniel Nolen: This episode was recorded at the Crown and Anchor in Provincetown.

[1:27:51] Daniel Nolen: Visit them online at only at the Crown.com.

[1:27:53] Daniel Nolen: This episode was edited by me, Daniel Nolen.

[1:27:56] Daniel Nolen: Thanks to Emmy winning composer and lyricist Lance Horn for the Broken Records theme song.

[1:28:01] Daniel Nolen: Follow us both, Ben Rimalower and Daniel Nolen on all y'all's socials.

[1:28:04] Daniel Nolen: That's Ben Rimalower, B-E-N R-I-M-A-L-O-W-E-R.

[1:28:10] Daniel Nolen: And that's Nolan with an E, not Nolan with an A.

[1:28:13] Daniel Nolen: Because Nolan with an A, isn't it?