COURTESY OF HONOLULU SYMPHONY
Michael McDonald sings Motown hits on his latest CD, "Michael McDonald Motown," which will be released in the United States on June 24.
He’s no fool
The Grammy-award winning artist,
who is performing with the Honolulu
Symphony Pops Orchestra, has reinvented
himself with the Motown sound
It's after midnight in Washington, D.C., when a travel-weary Michael McDonald answers the phone in his hotel suite.
Listen to the music
Michael McDonald with the Honolulu Symphony Pops Orchestra, Matt Catingub, conductor:Where: Blaisdell Concert Hall
When: 8 p.m. tomorrow and Saturday
Tickets: $15 to $57
Call: 792-2000
"Hey, how are ya?" he says in that identifiably gravel-though-velvet tone.
I tell him his voice precludes him from ever being a successful bank robber who would say, "Stick 'em up," and he quickly warbles the phrase in the melody from his three-time Grammy award-winning hit "What a Fool Believes."
"You're right; I guess they would know who I was before I said, 'Thank you very much,'" -- which he sings to the rhythm of his other Doobie Brothers' hit, "Minute by Minute."
"When I was really young and singing Motown stuff in clubs, we were also doing a lot of James Brown and Mitch Ryder & the Detroit Wheels, screaming our lungs out," the St. Louis-born singer-songwriter said. "Vocally, that would have lasted about 10 years, and my voice would have been shot."
So working in clubs, McDonald (who performs with the Honolulu Symphony Pops Orchestra this weekend) had to develop a singing style that would allow him to last the night without being hoarse the next day.
"My style came as much from that as anything," he said. "But emulating soul singers over the years, I just always enjoyed the way those artists sang; they all had their own little trademark. You wind up copying those things when you learn top-40 songs to play in clubs.
"But over the years, those things get a little dog-eared, and they fall into something that eventually becomes your own. I guess that's what I did."
It wasn't until his stints with the Doobie Brothers and Steely Dan that McDonald says he developed his trademark haunting falsetto style.
"Everyone's voices are an ever-changing instrument, and you have to adapt to them and find your strength at any given time," he says. "There are certain ranges I don't have anymore. My falsetto isn't near what it used to be. So you adapt."
MCDONALD is at a stage in his career where he's willing to take the occasional chance, as evident on his latest CD, "Michael McDonald Motown."
The all-Motown hits concept came from his new British record company, Universal Music International. Most of the songs were recorded in England and France, and the album was first released in Europe. (It comes out in the United States on June 24.)
Particularly surprising to McDonald was that a record company actually had an intriguing idea for an album.
"What I usually get is a record producer asking me to, like, write and sing a song with Christina Aguilera," he said. "I know no one's going to cross the street to hear me do that."
McDonald was already committed to the project by the time he realized the risk in covering such historic songs. His self-described salvation was growing up during the heyday of the Detroit soul label's domination of the pop radio charts.
"I had to fight to not let insecurities about myself or the power and significance of the music creep in," he said. "My fears could rage out of control."
Now here's a singer who has recorded dozens of albums, won Grammys and collaborated with the best singers in the business, and when it came time for the first recording session, McDonald seriously considered not flying to France to start the project.
"I was nervous big time. I told my wife, 'God, I'm afraid ... I'm just not going to able to cut it.' I mean, c'mon, Marvin Gaye's 'Grapevine' is a classic," he said. "What could I possibly bring to it?"
McDonald forced himself not to mimic the original vocals, though they were just as ingrained in his mind as the melodies.
But he chose the right man to produce the Motown album in Englishman Simon Climie. "I loved what he did on (Clapton's) 'Pilgrim' album, with traditional blues and R&B stuff yet some ethereal sonic ambience."
Early outline tracks were cut in London, with overdubbing in McDonald's adopted home of Nashville, Tenn., but the body of the vocals were recorded in Nice, in the south of France, where Climie lives.
"The original tracks were programmed -- they were sketches of what would be -- but I wanted to bring it over to a live musician feeling, so we overdubbed organs, bass and real drums on everything," he said.
McDonald's most recent honor was one of the more unexpected: His name was put on the Wall of Fame at McCluer High School back in St. Louis.
"I was stunned," he said. "I rarely showed up for class.
"It just goes to show what a fool believes ..."
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