This is Melissa Etheridge: interview

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Melissa Etheridge plays the Van Wezel Performing Arts Hall in Sarasota on Nov. 23 (courtesy photo by  John Tsiavis).

Melissa Etheridge plays the Van Wezel Performing Arts Hall in Sarasota on Nov. 23 (courtesy photo by John Tsiavis).

Melissa Etheridge’s smart, confessional songwriting and gutsy vocals have made her one of the most beloved rock ’n’ roll artists of her generation. Coming to Sarasota on Sunday in support of her compelling, personal new album “This is M.E.,” Etheridge has been in the spotlight since the 1990s when she won Grammy Awards for the songs “Come to My Window” and “Ain’t It Heavy.” January’s awards ceremony, though, will mark the 10th anniversary of Etheridge’s greatest Grammy moment.

Bald from the chemotherapy treatment she was undergoing for breast cancer, Etheridge stepped on stage looking beautiful and performed a medley of “Cry Baby/Piece of My Heart” in tribute to the late Janis Joplin. It’s one of the most memorable performances in Grammy history. To this day, Etheridge says, a week doesn’t go by without someone mentioning it to her.

“It was a personal sort of nervousness, I didn’t have any hair and just didn’t want people to laugh or make fun,” Etheridge says by phone. “But then there was such a warm response. It felt really great looking back.”
For many fans, “Piece of My Heart” is now as closely associated with Etheridge as Joplin. Might Sunday’s attendees at the Van Wezel Performing Arts Hall hear Etheridge sing her famous rendition of the Joplin hit?

“I will do it every now and then,” Etheridge says. “If it’s a special time, I’ll pull out that song; like if the show is crazy and we’re doing a second encore.”

In the near decade since that amazing Grammy Awards performance, Etheridge has won an Academy Award, for Best Original song in 2007 for “I Need to Wake Up,” a song she wrote and performed specifically for inclusion in the documentary “An Inconvenient Truth.” Etheridge has also been honored in recent years with a star on star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame.

Most important, she says, has been marrying longtime partner Linda Wallem, co-creator of the hit Showtime series “Nurse Jackie.” Also, launching their own record label ME Records. These events are what informed Etheridge’s new release “This is M.E.”

“This album is all about that summer of 2013 when I decided to make big changes and fired my management and lawyers and took more control of my career, which had flat-lined, and decided to grow my business with my wife, who is a much better business businesswoman,” Etheridge says with a laugh. “She really helped me and educated me and changed our new business and that got me more excited about making music on my own and with the producers I chose.”

Etheridge will be performing a mix of new material and her greatest hits on Sunday at the Van Wezel. In addition to “Come to My Window” and “Ain’t It Heavy," Etheridge’s best known songs include “I Want To Come Over,” "Fearless Love,” “I’m The Only One,” “I Need To Wake Up” and “If I Wanted To.” Although many of the songs are about two decades old, Etheridge, 53, still finds ways of making them exciting for the crowd as well as fresh for her.

"The emotion doesn’t cut like it used to," Etheridge says. “But rather than coming from a place that is desperate it comes from place where it’s fun to sing a fist-raised-in-the-air song that has become more of an anthem.”

Melissa Etheridge performs the medley "Cry Baby/Piece of My Heart" in a tribute to the late Janis Joplin at the 47th Annual Grammy Awards Sunday, Feb. 13, 2005, at the Staples Center in Los Angeles. (AP Photo/Kevork Djansezian)

Melissa Etheridge performs the medley "Cry Baby/Piece of My Heart" in a tribute to the late Janis Joplin at the 47th Annual Grammy Awards Sunday, Feb. 13, 2005, at the Staples Center in Los Angeles. (AP Photo/Kevork Djansezian)

Melissa Etheridge's biggest moments

Grammy win No. 1
Melissa Etheridge won her first Grammy in February of 1993. Named Best Rock Vocal, Female, for “Ain’t It Heavy,” Etheridge received the award about a month after she told the world she was gay at President Bill Clinton’s inaugural ball.

Grammy win No. 2
Etheridge won her second Grammy in 1995 for “Come to my Window,” again in the category Best Rock Vocal, Female. The song is on her landmark 1993 album “Yes I Am” that also includes the hits “I’m the Only One” and “If I Wanted To.”

Grammy performance
Bald from the chemotherapy treatment she was undergoing for breast cancer, Etheridge stepped on stage looking beautiful and performed a medley of “Cry Baby/Piece of My Heart” in tribute to the late Janis Joplin at the 47th Annual Grammy Awards. That performance on Feb. 13, 2005, in front of the capacity crowd at the Staples Center in Los Angeles and the millions watching on TV at home proved to be one of the most potent and moving in Grammy Awards history.

Academy Award
Etheridge won the Oscar for Best Original song in 2007 for “I Need to Wake Up,” a song she wrote and performed specifically for inclusion in the documentary “An Inconvenient Truth.” “Mostly I have to thank Al Gore, for inspiring us, for inspiring me, showing that caring about the Earth is not Republican or Democrats; it’s not red or blue, it’s all green,” Etheridge said during her Academy Award acceptance speech.

Walk of Fame
Etheridge received her star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame in September of 2011. Earlier that year, Universal Music Enterprises released the Melissa Etheridge greatest hits CD “Icon” as a celebration of “the lady who is most clearly associated with the women in rock revival in the 90s.”

Sources: AllMusic.com, AP.org., MelissaEtheridge.com, NYTimes.com, Parade.com

Melissa Etheridge
with opening act Alexander Cardinale
7 p.m. Sunday; Van Wezel Performing Arts Hall, 777 N. Tamiami Trail, Sarasota; $40-$95; 953-3368; vanwezel.org


Melissa Etheridge
with opening act Alexander Cardinale
7 p.m. Sunday; Van Wezel Performing Arts Hall, 777 N. Tamiami Trail, Sarasota; $40-$95; 953-3368; vanwezel.org

Wade_Tatangelo_by_Mike_Lang_HT_06212013
WADE TATANGELOis the editor of TICKET + and a contributor at TicketSarasota.com. He has been an entertainment editor, reporter, columnist and reviewer for more than a decade at publications nationwide. He is a Hershey, Pa., native who grew up in Tampa and graduated from the University of South Florida. Wade joined the Herald-Tribune in 2013 and writes the weekly Bar Tab column. He can be reached by email or call (941) 361-4955.
Last modified: November 25, 2014
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