Second Chance AFTER A CAREER IN PUBLIC SERVICE, SHE FOUND HER VOICE AS A SINGER
mute onstage, and Swayze put music aside for years. “It wasn’t until I came to California that I dared to sing again,” Swayze says. “I happened to be out one night with friends, having a particularly good time at a dinner house in Fresno, listening to a band. Suddenly I said, ‘I know these songs’ and walked up to the bandleader and said, ‘Do you know “The Masquerade Is Over”?’ He said, ‘What key?’ I looked at him like he had two heads, we did the proverbial ‘Hum a few bars,’ and I ended up working with that bandleader, Dick Scudder, for the next three years.”
BY JESSICA LASKEY ARTIST SPOTLIGHT
T
he song “The Seasons of My Time” perfectly describes the way Carolyne Swayze sees her life. It should: She wrote it. Swayze is a singer, songwriter, composer and novelist, though she didn’t start out that way. She spent 30 years in public service, first as a member of the Marine Corps, then as an investigator for the San Francisco District Attorney’s office (she carried a gun and a badge) and finally in the Department of Child Services. For the DCS job, she commuted 200 miles a day to and from her home in Campus Commons. “It was a ‘lifestone,’” Swayze says with an easy laugh. “Milestones mark your progress in life. Lifestones are burdens you have to deal with. Finally, one day I hit a wall emotionally. I said, ‘No more commute.’ I was loaned to the state here in Sacramento for six months and then I said, ‘I think I’m ready to retire.’” Retirement allowed Swayze to return to her first love: music. As a child growing up in Chicago, Swayze was surrounded by music, between her maternal grandmother (“a devout Mennonite who played piano and sang only of gospel praises”) and another grandmother figure who sang opera and jazz. But her family was far from encouraging. Her grandfather, the first African-American bishop in the Mennonite Church, told a young Swayze that she should “learn how to type or become a teacher” instead of sing. When Swayze finally got her
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She spent 30 years in public service, first as a member of the Marine Corps, then as an investigator for the San Francisco District Attorney’s office (she carried a gun and a badge) and finally in the Department of Child Services. Carolyne Swayze is a local vocalist, composer, songwriter and novelist
mother to drive her to an audition for Ted Mack’s “Original Amateur Hour” (the “American Idol” of its day), the
pressure was more than she could handle. An embarrassing bout of stage fright left the 14-year-old all but
Swayze credits Scudder with giving her the formal singing training she’d always longed for: how to breathe, ARTIST page 54