MUSIC By Alex Greene
Until We Meet Again Mark Edgar Stuart comes full circle.
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THURSDAY A AY MARCH 17 • 7PM MEMPHIS
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The results are easy, breezy, and natural, thanks to the producers’ focus on feel above all else.
he reflects. “On the second record, there was more cancer stuff and stuff about my wife and our little troubles.” After that, he found himself collaborating with the likes of Keith Sykes, working on the follow-up to his sophomore album. But somehow, he wasn’t connecting. “When the third record came around, I’d been hanging out with these really great songwriters, and I think I let their craft influence my craft. Looking back on that, I should have just recognized my craft as being weird and unique.” Now, with Until We Meet Again, he’s come full circle back to himself. He credits his producers with helping him find his voice as never before, partly by choosing the songs. “The ones Dawn and Reba picked just so happen to be about love and life,” he says. “About writing love letters at a time when no one writes love letters. And fishing in heaven. And dying one day. I don’t think men would have picked all those songs. It took these two women to do that. Their biggest contribution was the song selection. They gave the whole record a theme. I feel like I’m saying something again.” The Mark Edgar Stuart album release show will feature a full band and opener Kelley Mickwee, The Green Room at Crosstown Arts, Friday, March 4, 7:30 p.m. Visit crosstownarts.org for details.
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ARTS & ENTERTAINMENT
alking about his new alPHOTO: BRUCE WATSON bum, Until We Mark Edgar Stuart Meet Again, singer/songwriter Mark Edgar Stuart thinks back on his first recording session, at Sun Studio. Over in his hometown of Pine Bluff, Arkansas, 15-yearold Stuart played in a band with the nephew of Memphis Horns trumpeter Wayne Jackson. Jackson booked the band at Sun as an avuncular gift, befriending Stuart in the process. “Wayne took a liking to me,” Stuart recalls. “That was one reason I came to Memphis. He was my first mentor.” It just so happened that the engineer on those ancient sessions was Dawn Hopkins, who, fastforwarding a few decades, was also behind the board for Until We fine. “They come from that Jim Dickinson Meet Again. “Working with Dawn was school of thought,” Stuart says. “It’s just a real full-circle moment,” Stuart says about the emotion. Every song just took wistfully. “Here I am 30 years later, going one or two takes. It’s pretty much what back to the basics, and Dawn’s at the helm! I do when you see me live.” The result is I love these full circles. And the whole an album of spare arrangements, often record’s full of them.” featuring just Stuart’s voice and guitar, Hopkins works with co-producer with an occasional second guitar, bass, Reba Russell, a renowned singer and light drums, or background vocal — and songwriter in her own right. Under the plenty of breathing room. name “The Blue Eyed Bitches,” the two are making waves around Memphis and beyond with their naturalistic approach to production. Not long after producing the acclaimed Delta Joe Sanders, they set their sights on Stuart. Reba approached Madjack’s Ronny Russell and asked, “Do you think Mark would let us produce a record on him? I love that guy.” It caught Stuart unawares. These days, with Stuart established as “I got a green light to make a record one of the best singer/songwriters around, and I wasn’t even looking to do it,” he it’s hard to imagine that he started writing marvels. Being a singer herself, Reba heard less than 10 years ago. Until then he was untapped potential in Stuart’s voice. “That a bass player, first for the Pawtuckets and was her big pitch to Ronny: She wanted to then as a hired gun on many recording produce me as a singer,” says Stuart. “She sessions and tours. Eventually, backing told me, ‘I know there’s a voice living inside quality songwriters like Cory Branan, Jack there, and you haven’t tapped into it yet.’” Oblivian, and John Paul Keith inspired him The results are easy, breezy, and to try his hand at the craft. natural, thanks to the producers’ focus on “On the first record, I had something to feel above all else. That suits Stuart just say about my cancer and about my dad,”
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