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Metronome Magazine posted: 7/1/2008 Published July 2008 By Brian M. Owens Singer-songwriter Rebecca Padula is quickly becoming one of Vermont's musical treasures. Holstered with a double degree in music and journalism from St. Michael's College, Padula has penned more than 40 original songs and released 3 albums: Fire & Water (2008), Time, Speed & Distance (2003), and Waterfront (1997). Among her many awards for songwriting, Padula has also written for a number of New England based publications, is a documentary filmmaker (Margaret's Waltz), which was named Best Documentary Event of 2007 by the Northeast Regional Alliance for Community Media. She is also producer/director of "The Instant Coffeehouse" a monthly public access TV program that showcases contemporary singer-songwriters. Rebecca and I spoke by phone on a beautiful May afternoon and she filled me in on her busy life... METRONOME: Where are you from? Originally from Grafton, Massachusetts. I came up here to Vermont to go to St. Michael's. I've pretty much been here ever since. METRONOME: It's nice up there. I like it a lot. Grafton is a small town, so when I was a kid, it was like Vermont is now. METRONOME: Was there music in your house as a kid growing up? Not so much. I'm the only musician. My other siblings are pretty artistic. My brother is a really good visual artist and I have a sister who works in theater in Boston as a costume and wig designer. METRONOME: What got you into music? I was a music major at St. Michael's and I sang at school and at church growing up. I really got into the singer-songwriter thing here in Burlington (Vermont), going to shows at the Burlington Coffeehouse. It was at the time when Dar Williams and Richard Shindell, Peter Mulvey... those guys were just starting out touring. METRONOME: Were those the people that actually inspired you to play? Yeah. I didn't know much about the singer-songwriter thing.. that you could be a solo artist. I listened to jazz and bands like the Grateful Dead. I was a big Phish head in college. METRONOME: Going to St. Michael's as a music major, did you plan on teaching music when you graduated? Really, it was a double major. My parents told me I had to have a real major, so I was at St. Michael's to be a journalism student. METRONOME: When did you decide to buy a guitar and start performing? I got the guitar in high school. I wanted to learn some Grateful Dead songs. A neighbor played guitar and showed me the four chords. I didn't start to play more seriously until I was at St. Michael's and was studying guitar, although my instrument was voice. METRONOME: Did you join a band while going to college? I was in a band, a duo called Table Wine with a classmate, Chris Burrage who was a bass player and singer. METRONOME: Was it all original music or were you playing covers? It was pretty much all originals. METRONOME: When did you make the transformation to the Rebecca Padula Band? I've always liked to play with other people in the format of a songwriter's round. A lot of songwriters can play different instruments, so people can jam along with each other. Plus, I've been playing with Mitch Barron for quite a while as a duo when he's available and when the gig pays enough to pay us both. METRONOME: How long has Mitch been playing with you? My previous CD, Time, Speed & Distance is pretty much a duo album, me and Mitch. METRONOME: Was that your first CD release? That was my second. Chris actually played on the first one, which was in 1997. Time, Speed & Distance was 2003, so Mitch and I have been playing together since about 2000. METRONOME: What was the name of your first CD? Waterfront. METRONOME: Was it just you and Chris? It was mostly Chris and I and we had a couple of guest musicians come in and give it more of a band sound. METRONOME: What inspired the album Waterfront? The CD cover had a great picture that I took of the Burlington waterfront, I spent a lot of summers on the cape as well... plus I'm an Aquarius. METRONOME: Tell me about your second album, Time, Speed & Distance. Was that primarily a duo record? Yeah. It's me on acoustic guitar. I do most of the vocals and Mitch sings backup with me on a tune. Our co-producer/engineer, Matthew Shippee, who was a classmate of mine, recorded it at his home studio in Northampton, MA. He's playing down in Northampton at the moment with a band called Swing Caravan. They play gypsy jazz, he's an amazing guitar player. METRONOME: In support of your first two albums would you play in coffeehouses and venues of that type? Yes, as a duo or solo. METRONOME: What made you decide to put a band together? I just wanted the sound to be a little bigger for some of the songs on this project. I had tried a couple of shows with some different drummers and it just added so much to the sound that it made me want to find someone who could do it more regularly. Bringing a drum set and a big PA system into a little coffeehouse scares people a little bit (laughs). I think it also opens up some different venues for us. METRONOME: You settled on a drummer named Shrimp. How long has he been with you? Shrimp's been with me for a little while. METRONOME: How did you meet him? On Cragslist actually. He moved up here a year or so ago from Connecticut and he's becoming pretty in demand. He's a real experienced guy and is starting to build a studio in the Northeast Kingdom here. continued on next post...

More from Metronome posted: 7/1/2008 METRONOME: Where did you record your new album Fire & Water? We recorded at Egan Media in Colchester, Vermont. METRONOME: How did you hook up with Joe Egan? I knew he had a great studio and I did some demo recordings for a theater production that he mastered. So, I went to check it out and it was perfect. It's a big professional studio with three spaces of sound separation. There were three of us, so we were able to record a lot of things live, yet still have separation to mix. METRONOME: For the live tracks, did you set up in the same room facing each other to play? No, we had three separate spaces, but there's glass separating you. Actually, when Mitch played electric he was in the same space with Shrimp and I was looking through the door at them. METRONOME: Did you find yourself doing a lot of vocal overdubs? For the basic tracks, it's a lot of one take things. There are a few songs where I went back and wanted to redo the vocal or redo the guitar and that meant I had to redo the vocal as well. At least half of the songs on Fire & Water are the basic tracks- drums, guitar, bass and vocals all in one shot. That really speeds up your time in the studio. METRONOME: Your album, Fire & Water really snuck up on me. I started listening, and the more I listened, the more I liked what you were doing. It's an excellent album. Thanks. I had a chance to surround myself with some great local musicians that helped me to raise the bar.. people like Jamie Masefield and Paul Asbell are world-class even though they're local. METRONOME: Would you consider yourself a natural singer, or does it come hard for you? I studied voice, but I've always been able to sing. METRONOME: So it's easier than it is harder? Yeah. METRONOME: How about your guitar playing? That's harder (laughs). METRONOME: I noticed you're playing a Taylor acoustic, is that your guitar of choice? That's my main guitar, the Taylor Jumbo with the maple back and sides. METRONOME: How long have you owned that? I got that right before the Waterfront album... so, 1996 or 1997. METRONOME: So you've had it for a good long time? Yeah. That guitar's rock steady. METRONOME: Have you re-fretted it yet? I've had the frets dressed. I'm pretty easy on the guitar. It's the Vermont weather that's hard on it. METRONOME: Why did you name your new album Fire & Water? Some of the song titles are more obvious than others. For Time, Speed & Distance, all the songs had something to do with time, travel or distance. Fire & Water is another thematic choice where all these songs have something to do with fire and water or contrast. METRONOME: I noticed you co-wrote a song with Rachel Bissex called, "Less." Did she also contribute "Never Go Back" to the album? I cover her song "Never Go Back." Rachel died a few years ago. She was a good friend. In the last year she was performing, I was one of a couple of New England artists that was traveling around with her as she was going through chemo. I was driving her and singing backup for a gig in Stowe. We were driving back through the Williston area where they had just built a Walmart. That was the site of a long-fought battle against Walmart here in Vermont. So, Rachel had the idea for the song and I ran with it. We e-mailed lyrics back and forth a few times and I played her different versions. She sent me back to the drawing board quite a few times until we got that one right. That is possibly the last song she wrote. METRONOME: How did the Walmart experience effect the song? Vermont was one of the last states to get a Walmart. There's actually a battle going on now in St. Albans (VT) where local residents are opposing the building of the second or third Walmart in the state. It's because Walmart tends to be antagonistic to Mom and Pop local stores, which is what Vermont is fiercely about. So, "Less" addresses the concerns of the people. You're selling for less, but at what cost? METRONOME: I like your song "Match," what is that one about? "Match" is one of the few love songs. I tend not to write about that because everyone else does (laughs). Nothing bores me faster than a set with 10 love songs in it. But being a songwriter, you can't totally get away with that. METRONOME: So you put it as the first song on the album! I just liked how that one came out. Paul Asbell did such a cool thing on the guitar. He really made it sparkle. I wrote that over the long winter, trying to get my wood stove to fire up. METRONOME: What is the song "Campfirelight" about? I wrote "Campfirelight" after being at Falcon Ridge Folk Festival one year, being up all night jamming at camp fire kinds of jams. I love to do that sort of thing. One of my neighbors here, Rik Palieri is a traditional musician and he has some great parties at his house. I love to go to those and jam along on some traditional fiddle tunes that I don't know. When it's my turn to call a song in that kind of circle, I wanted something that would work in that setting, so I wrote that song. METRONOME: I like the groove on "Red River Blues." Tell me about that song. That's a song I picked up in one of those jams. Rik actually taught me the Leadbelly version and over time it migrated to that groove that you hear on the album. I changed the lyrics a bit too to suit me- it's fun to sing that song. METRONOME: Where can people buy your CDs? They are pretty much exclusively online at www.cdbaby.com and CD Baby distributes it to i-tunes and a lot of other digital download sites. METRONOME: Is there anything else exciting going on? I just wrote a theme song for a video for Mercy Connections. They have a prison mentoring program for women getting released from prison in Vermont A friend of mine at an access station was doing a shortform documentary on them and was looking for some theme music. She sent me some quotes from the interviews she'd done and I created a song for them called "Road to Freedom." I'm going to perform it for them next week when they premiere the documentary. I would love to do more music for video and TV.

Homegrown Acts on Disk posted: 6/19/2008 The Burlington Free Press published June 19, 2008 By Brent Hallenbeck, Free Press Staff Writer CAROL ABAIR: VOICES OF FRIENDS The album, not unlike "Turning back beautiful," features singers such as Karen McFeeters, Kip Meaker and the late Rachel Bissex performing the country-folk works of Carol Abair, a Burlington songwriter. She is celebrating the release of this disk with a concert on Saturday (see more on this in Ramdom Notes). REBECCA PADULA BAND: FIRE & WATER The folk musician appeared on Carol Abair's album, so it's only fitting that Padula performs a couple of Abair's songs on this disk. "Fire & Water" displays the full-voiced singer backed by an impressive roster of Vermont-based musicians including guitarists Paul Asbell and Dave Keller, vocalist/fiddler Susannah Blachly and Padula's fellow Hinesburger, banjo player Rik Palieri.

Rebecca Padula proves a rich alto Powerhouse posted: 4/20/2008 Published: 4/18/08 The Barre-Montpelier Times Argus By Art Edelstein, Arts Correspondent Vermont has several legendary voices. Among the men, Jon Gailmor from Elmore comes to mind. Among the women we have Patti Casey of East Montpelier and Tammie Fletcher from Eden. We can now add Rebecca Padula of Hinesburg to that list. Padula, a name I was not previously familiar with, has produced her third album. Her band consists of electric/double bassist Mitch Barron and drummer “Shrimp.” Padula performs on acoustic guitar throughout. Together, this trio, along with a few guest musicians, has produced a very fine recording. Padula’s voice, a rich alto powerhouse, is the focal point here while she also has solid credentials as a songwriter. She also sings several songs penned by her Vermont contemporaries. Padula’s voice is good enough that she could, and perhaps should, explore other styles beyond those in the folksinger-songwriter category. I envisage her with a full-tilt boogie rock band or on stage in a musical. There is a lot of projection in this woman’s vocal cords and a real sense of understanding the power in her singing. Padula might, but never does overstretch, or otherwise unleash vocal gymnastics that aren’t necessary. She’s got enough control to realize that her delivery, as is, needs little else to get the song across with panache. I also like her diction, as her words are crystal-clear. On the opening “Match,” with Paul Asbel’s guitar wizardry leading the charge, Padula delivers a hefty measure of upbeat. Padula has chosen to sing other writers’ work and on track three, Carol Abair’s “Whistle Me Dixie” has her in soft and sensitive mode. Abair is fine songwriter and her song “My Only Son” won best song of the year for 2007 in our annual Tammie Awards. I also like the Abair-penned folk song on track eight “When I Leave Winooski.” Track four finds Padula interpreting Susannah Blachly’s “After Rain.” Blachly is a fine and prolific writer from Calais whose own recordings have drawn considerable attention on these pages. “After Rain” is a song with a Latin flavor. Here Padula gives a jazzier interpretation to the material, letting Vermont’s mandolin genius Jamie Masefield take the instrumental lead. Padula also pays homage to the late Rachel Bissex by performing her song, “Never Go Back.” Here we get a blues/jazz treatment with Gregory Douglass on back up vocals. There are several styles presented on this CD. Padula’s own “What’s Going On?” a bluesy questioning of world issues pertaining to Darfur, Iraq and Bosnia, finds Montpelier’s Dave Keller on electric guitar and Phil Abair on organ. They add just enough kick to propel the song through a shopping list of world misery. Padula’s other songs are strong too. For example, “The Neighbors” discusses abuse; “Less” is about the loss of the family farm; “We Are Free” is a peace anthem; while “At Bedtime” is a sweet acoustic number penned for a child. There’s a lot of lyrical ground covered on this album. Throughout Barron and Shrimp know when to hold back on the quiet tunes and when to let go on the faster-paced numbers. If there are any problems with this CD they are in the direction Padula wants to travel as an artist. It is obvious that she knows lots of excellent musicians and songwriters and has included them in this project. The result is a recording that is a bit hard to classify. I suspect her sensibilities run toward pure folk and all she really needs is her voice and acoustic guitar to get the message across. By choosing to have a back-up band and guest musicians Padula has expanded that original direction and it gets a bit scattered in this presentation. That said, if you want to hear another of the fine voices in Vermont music then “Fire & Water” by Rebecca Padula and Band should be on your shopping list. You can hear this trio live next on Saturday May 24 at the Skinny Pancake at 60 Lake St. in Burlington at 9 p.m. Find this review at the Times Argus online here .

Rebecca Padula's Rocked Up Sound posted: 4/5/2008 Published: April 5, 2008 The Addison Eagle By Lou Varricchio It's no easy undertaking for a self-published author or self-recorded musician to market his or her own creations in a sea of commercial product. Many area bookstore and music store buyers are often reluctant to showcase local talent for a variety of excuses, many of them lame. But ironically, many independent creators offer fresh material that hasn't been published by a committee in New York or Los Angeles bent on pushing cookie cutter arts and letters that regurgitate the same old boring topics and themes. Enter Vermont indie singer-songwriter Rebecca Padula. The local musician is a rare find and her CDs are worth checking out. Padula will release her third independent album in April. She has been performing mainly as a solo roots based singer-songwriter; this project marks a departure into a fuller rocked-up ensemble sound. The CD entitles, "Fire & Water" features members of Padula's backing band, longtime bassist Mitch Barron and new percussionist "Shrimp" and a host of guest stars including: Gregory Douglass, Paul Asbell, Dave Keller, Phil Abair, Jamie Masefield, Rik Palieri and Colin McCaffrey. Most of the 14 tunes on "Fire & Water" were written by Padula with a few exceptions. Vermont writers Carol Abair, Susannah Blachly and the late Rachel Bissex also appear as songwriters. Blachly lends her vocal and fiddle talents as well. The band covers a range of musical styles covered from traditional acoustic blues to bluegrass to rock to bossa nova. A lot of the album's subtext is political. Padula said she gets turned off by us verses them party politics, "we need to find a way to listen, not just talk at each other." In 2007 she won the Vermont Peace Songs Contest with her song, "We Are Free," which appears on the new album. Her folk concert documentary film, "Margaret's Waltz," a tribute to Vermont folksong collector Margaret MacArthur, was recognized as 2007's "Best Documentary Event" by the Northeast Alliance for Community Media. The Cd is available online at www.cdbaby.com and iTunes.

In The Studio posted: 4/24/2008 Published: April 23, 2008 The Burlington Free Press by Lynn Monty Free Press Staff Writer Hinesburg resident Rebecca Padula will celebrate her third independent CD at 8 p.m. Saturday at the Hinesburg Town Hall. Padula describes her music as contemporary folk with a blues streak. She is known for playing local coffeehouses and small acoustic venues, but wanted to hold the CD release party at the Hinesburg Town Hall so she could have a quiet place to play without a cappuccino machine whizzing or TV blasting the ball game overhead, she said. Padula also needed plenty of room for her new band. The CD, "Fire & Water" features Padula's longtime bassist, Mitch Barron and new percussionist "Shrimp" along with a host of local musicians. "We play a lot of different styles of music," Padula said. "There is a bossa nova tune, bluegrass, folk, jazz, rock and blues. Having a band realy helps accomplish there styles." Her second CD was recorded in a small home studio with its simple and sparse arrangements, in contrast, "Fire & Water" was recorded at Egan Media Productions. "We needed a big space this time, instead of me recording in one room and Mitch in the bathroom." "The way the music industry is going right now, I think independent is the way to go," she said. "I am able to be an independent artist and still have my CD distributed online," she said. "Fire & Water" will be available on i-Tunes and Rhapsody. Padula's last two CDs were co-produced, but this time she is the sole producer. She also designed the cover graphics and is actively seeking venues to play. "It's competitive," she said. "There are a lot of singer-songwriters, especially in New England." While there might be quite a few acoustic musicians in the area, there are not many venues. She used to play at the Burlington Coffeehouse when it was here, she said, but coffeehouses are known to come and go. "I am thinking having the band will lend itself to playing some bigger venues, she said. "Now we have a CD to send out. It's hard to get booked when yu don't have a recording." Padula is also the channel coordinator at Lake Champlain Access Television. She is responsible for training the public to use the equipment and produce their own TV shows. Since 2004, she has produced a monthly public access TV show, "The Instant Coffeehouse" showcasing singer-songwriters. The show features Vermonters and an occaisional touring artist, she said. Padula's song, featured on the new CD, "We Are Free" won the 2007 Vermont Peace Songs Contest. The song was written for a peace rally situation, she said. The chorus is, "We are free to think, we are free to speak, we are free to fight, and free to stop, we are free to change the world, free to change our minds." "Last year was a good year for me," Padula said. "I started recording this album on April. I just finished my first documentary, 'Margaret's Waltz' and won the Vermont Peace Songs Contest. So, I'm hoping this is all building to 'Fire & Water' and doing a lot more performing." Her concert documentary film, "Margaret's Waltz" was tribute to Vermont folk song collector Margaret MacArthur and was recognized as 2007's Best Documentary Event by the Northeast Alliance for Community Media. As for doing music full-time she said, "I would love to, but realistically most independent artists can't because we need health insurance."

Fire & Water Album Review posted: 5/16/2008 Published: 4/22/08 Sevendays By Dan Bolles Hinesburg songwriter Rebecca Padula is one of the hardest-working and highly respected musicians in Vermont’s sprawling folk scene. A darling of the coffeehouse circuit, she has shared the stage with numerous big-name acts such as Patty Larkin, Vance Gilbert and the late Rachel Bissex. Padula graduated from St. Michael’s College with a double major in music and journalism, and her pursuit of those seemingly disparate disciplines likely goes a long way toward informing the musical polish and wealth of thematic material found on her latest release, Fire & Water. But the fruit of scholastic labor can be a double-edged sword. While her jazz and classical vocal training and journalistic sensibilities provide a fertile songwriting foundation, Padula’s performances, while technically immaculate, trend towards rigidity and frequently come off as, well, academic. As the title of her third disc implies, balance and contrast are central themes throughout the recording. Padula possesses a journalist’s keen eye, which serves her well when tackling topics such as the plight of Vermont’s disappearing farms on “Less,” and war on “What’s Going On?” But her observations are more reportage than poetry and largely lack the lyrical immediacy to truly move the listener. The feel-good, white-bread funk of the latter tune does little to alleviate the issue. However, Padula does offer moments of subtle narrative intimacy, as on “The Neighbors” (CLICK HERE TO LISTEN). The song deals with an ugly, and likely ongoing, domestic feud, deftly capturing the helplessness one can’t help but feel witnessing such an event. “I can’t imagine, they were ever sincere / she wakes the kids with seatbelts tight / they’ll all be back tomorrow night,” she sings. Padula peppers her own compositions with tunes by other notable Vermont songwriters, such as Susannah Blachly, Carol Abair and Bissex, who co-wrote the aforementioned “Less.” Surrounding herself with a crack backing band composed of some of the area’s finest musicians — mandolin marvel Jamie Masefield, blues guitarist Dave Keller and banjo guru Rik Palieri, among others — Padula’s tunes are impeccably played. But the price of technical precision often manifests itself as a seeming stiffness. And here we stumble upon Fire & Water’s most unfortunate flaw. As previously mentioned, Padula was vocally trained in both classical and jazz and is an obvious talent. Though not for lack of effort or heart, here she simply sounds like a classically trained singer trying to sound like a folkie. The result is too clean. Too perfect. Too . . . studied. The Rebecca Padula Band releases its latest this Saturday at the Hinesburg Town Hall.

Indie Con posted: 11/8/2007 Indie-con was great fun. Thanks to APR, Antara, Rik Palieri, Aaron Flinn, Erin McDermott and Carol Abair for joining in my songwriter's in thr round showcase and to Jim Lockeridge for including my film, "Margaret's Waltz" in the festivities. And readers, please check out the great Living Section story the Freeps wrote about Margaret's Waltz in the Video section of this site.