Independent aggressive folk artist Tret Fure’s career spans four decades.  From her early days at Michigan coffee houses to playing blues guitar to rock to punk to her long-lasting partnership in women’s music with Cris Williamson to her current work in aggressive folk, her music continues to evolve.  I had a chance to speak with her last week about that evolution, her life, her loves, and her new CD due out in May, The Horizon.

Fure started out in music playing piano at age 5.  By 20, she had hit LA and lived with June Millington of Fanny and through a connection in the band met Spencer Davis and worked with him for over a year ultimately writing a single on his album Mouse Trap called Rainy Season. That led to her first solo album in ’73 on MCA Records which was produced by the late legendary Lowell George of Little Feat fame.

As she neared 30 and had a spate of making record deals and losing them, she decided to try her hand at sound engineering because she found it fascinating and there really few women working in the industry.

Hahn: How did you make such a dent in such a male-dominated industry?

Fure: I was one of the first woman engineers in LA, not the first, but one of the first and I was the first woman asked to join IATSE, which was the union for film engineers.  I would have had to pay $1,100 a year (to join).  It’s a great honor (to be asked) but I wasn’t going to spend that kind of money to be the first woman.

Engineering kept me alive through the rest of the 70s in LA and by the time the 1980 rolled around, I reconnected with June.

Through June I discovered the genre of women’s music.  I produced and engineered an album for her called Heart Songs. Started a record company so we could promote her and I sold that record to Olivia Records.  Through Olivia I met Cris Williamson.

A lot of people thought my career started when I met Cris, but I had been in the industry for ten years before that making my own strides.

Hahn: You and Cris were together personally and professionally for like 20 years and I know that when you two broke up it caused quite a divide among your fans.  It’s been a number of years now, how do you look back at all that divisiveness now in retrospect?

Fure: You know it was really hard for people.  It’s a very intimate group, the women’s movement.  The whole women’s music scene was very incestuous in many ways.  We had an identity, we formed an identity, and we had strength in our identity in a really male-dominated world.  By the 90s we were a duo, we weren’t solo acts backing each other – we were a duo and became the poster children for co-dependency for women.  We were the couple who were going to last forever and who people looked up to and said, “This is how love can be and we can make it.”

When I left, people couldn’t believe it because they had to reevaluate their own lives.  If we could break up, anybody could.  I mean, I used to get e-mails from people who said, “You have to stay together for us.”  [Hahn starts laughing] “Wait, this is my life?”

Hahn: I suppose you bump into each other on the circuit?

Fure: We do occasionally.  I wouldn’t say we’re great friends but I miss her in my life.  She’s a very wise and funny woman.  It’s just still too hard in a lot of ways.  I run into her at P-town every year and we’ve bumped into each other at the Folk Alliance conference a couple of years.  We really don’t keep in touch.  I keep in touch through friends who feel they have to keep me up to date on what she’s doing.  I went to see her show at women’s week last year, which I haven’t done in a while.  When we see each other it’s very sweet, very tender, but we’re really not in each other’s life.  People sometimes ask when the Cris and Tret reunion is going to be and I don’t think it ever will.  But, you never know.

Hahn: And, I suppose being an “and”…you know Cris and Tret is tough.  I think she ended up with your joint tour after you broke up and you had to rebuild because you had been so closely associated for so long.  It seems to me that you blossomed after that breakup and your own identity shineds through hugely.

Tret: Thank you and thank you for doing your homework, that’s great! [Tret laughs] Yeah, I was the “and.”  What was interesting was that we did split up and started doing our own music; people began to see that I had a much greater influence on our music than people realized.  I have a really strong musical background, I play a lot of  instruments and I’m interested in a lot of different variations of music that Cris doesn’t have because her background is really piano and very folky.  We became an entity that was greater than the both of us.  We worked together lyrically, we were together musically, but a lot of the music came from me.  People realized that after we split up, “Oh, my God, you were huge influence musically and lyrically.”  That’s one of the reasons I couldn’t stay in that.  I would have always been associated with her.  I had my own style; I had my own music, and had my own stuff to say.

The breakup was so hard.  It killed me. People think I walked away blithely. It was one of the hardest things, other than the death of my mother that has ever happened to me. And, I was able to write prolifically about it.  I found my own heart, my own core again, which I needed to do.  One of the things that helped me during that time –  even though on the one hand people were blasting me for leaving Cris, and would say “I’m never buying your music,”   I would think, “But, look what happened to me.”  There were those who said, “Thanks for having the courage to leave.”  I was almost 50 years old and that’s hard walking away from a 20-year relationship.  I had someone come up and say, “You gave me the courage to look at my life and to make that change and to not stay stuck and not to stay because it’s hard to leave.”  I gave some people courage and heart and that was really great for me.

I do think I’ve found my audience and my music which continues to grow and change and blossom.  My heart is in folk, it’s where I started.

Hahn: You mentioned your union participation and Local 1000 of the American Federation of Musicians which serves traveling musicians.  I had never given it a thought, but to have benefits of union membership and such simple things like health insurance and pensions must be huge.

Fure: Folk musicians have never really had that benefit.  But, my good brothers fought for this union.  It’s the only way touring folk musicians can get a pension.  We no longer have to work in one jurisdiction to make contributions to a pension plan.  As a result, I can get a pension now.  And a lot of my co-workers are already receiving a pension through Local 1000.  It’s phenomenal.

I’m always trying to get younger women musicians involved because they don’t realize that if they get in at a young age they’d get an incredible pension.  But, as younger people it’s hard to talk to them about pensions.

Hahn: As a former HR manager, I can tell you getting younger people to realize that even health insurance is important is tough. [Hahn and Fure both laugh]

Fure: Yeah, it’s tough!  God, it’s not that big a deal.  You just do a little paperwork after a gig and send in a check.  I mean, Ellis Delaney—who I just adore—she’s like “Yeah, we’re going to join, we’re going to join.”  She’d already be vested and she’d already have a huge pension, but you just don’t get around to it.

Hahn: Are you still vice president of Local 1000?

Fure: Yeah, still the vice president.

Hahn: I know it’s probably like how I feel about my children, I love them all equally, but some days I like one better than another.  If you had to pick something you wrote that’s stood up strongest over time, what would it be and why?

Fure: Probably When the Wind Blows. It’s a really powerful song to me that is very personal and also very universal.  It’s really about how we’re detached in our life and how we don’t connect with people anymore.  I like the way the words flow and the way the music flows.

Another song that I love is My Love for You off of True Compass.

But probably the most important song I think I’ve written is going to be on the next CD called  Grace of God and it’s about almost losing my brother in a car accident.  It really touches people in a really incredible way.

Hahn: You’ve been test-driving around town?

Fure: Oh, yeah, I’ve been playing it at all of my shows and people just weep.

Hahn: I know you’ve said in the past that your fans are aging with you, changing with you, growing with you.  Do you think aggressive folk can resonate with a younger audience?

Fure: Absolutely!  I long to have younger women at my shows.  My music is timeless.  I am getting older and I do talk about aging and I do look a little more closely at death.  I live a young life, I take care of myself, I don’t feel my age, I don’t act my age and I don’t think my music reflects my age and my music is for everybody.

Because my audience is getting older sometimes they are more “Eh, I’m tired and not going out tonight.”  I want younger women and younger men there.  I want to continue to have an audience.  I need some fuckin’ young blood!

Hahn: What I’ve heard from people who have been to your shows is you’re lookin’ pretty good.  You don’t look your age and your voice certainly sounds very young.

Fure: Thank you.

Hahn: I cannot even believe how many things you are doing. So, tell me about some of the many, many things you’re doing.  For example, how the heck does music translate into making a cookbook?

Fure: Well, if I wasn’t in music I would be in a restaurant.

Hahn: Now, where is another you? I need one. [Both laugh]

Fure: I’ve had that said to me before.  I love to cook.  I’m very passionate about food.  Music and food keep us alive and nurture us. I love cooking.  When I left LA the things my friends said they missed the most was not me, but my meals.

So, I thought “I’m going to make a cookbook for all my closest friends in LA.”  So, I did and gave them to all my friends.  And, one of my friends owned a small publishing company and told me she wanted to put it out for me professionally as a contribution to my CD, which was Back Home.  I hope to do a second volume someday, because my cooking has changed so much.

Now I auction off dinners for National Women’s Music Festival to help keep it (the festival) alive.  It’s the oldest women’s music festival.  My partner produces it.   People love these meals. It’s been a lot of fun for me and rewarding.

Hahn: You’re doing house concerts these days too, right?

Fure: Yeah, I’m doing a lot of house concerts which is one of the oldest forms of intimate concert experiences.  I enjoy it often more than clubs.  It’s quite a special experience.  But, I still do clubs, concerts, and festivals.

Hahn: And, you’ve got Jane, your partner.  How did you two get together?

Fure: We met through my music.  She and her partner and Cris and I were friends.  Over a period of two or three years, we became very close friends.  Jane and I over time, sort of realized we had more than a friendship there.  After she broke up with her partner – you know – we come from very different backgrounds – she’s not in music, but she’s involved in music and has produced the National for several years and helped produce Tomboy Girl festival before that.  She’s a great believer in women’s music and the arts.  She’s followed my music since she was in college.  She’s 15 years my junior and is a hospital administrator.  What we share in common is love of family, love of music, love of our home and our dogs and we have a great time together.  It’s a very deep love and commitment we have.

Hahn: I hear it in your music.  I’m guessing Drivin’ is about her?

Fure: Yes.  I lost my booking agent in the divorce.    Jane said, “Hey, I can do this.”

So, we started Tomboy Girl Records and sold clothes at the shows and traveled for three years. Certainly, that was a great time and a lot of great music came out of it and Drivin’ was one of the best.

Hahn: Tomboy Girl, your retail online store has all kinds of merchandise.  Was that easy to get growing?

Fure: The name comes from my song Tomboy Girl about growing up a tomboy.  People loved the identification.  It’s something that people could own.   At the retail store, my biggest clients were younger girls – especially with Title IX.  Their mothers would come in and say, “Yeah, my daughter is a tomboy she plays soccer.”  We closed the store and I’m not carrying much on the road – it’s a pain in the ass to carry 70-pounds of clothing everywhere you go. There will always be Tomboy Girl merchandise, just not in the volume I used to carry.

Hahn: You’ve got the new CD coming out soon?

Fure: Yeah, it’s coming out in May hopefully and it’s called The Horizon and I’m really, really starting to work on that and looking forward to it.  I’m going to have some really great women musicians working on it.  I’ve been doing the solo track and haven’t started on the band track yet.  I’m working on it in my own studio.

And, I’m really hoping to get out to the West Coast in the fall or next spring at the latest.

Hahn: Thanks for your time Tret.  And, thanks for lending your voice to the Starr Ann podcasts too!

Fure: Doing it is a lot of fun!

You can find Tret at her Website ,  Facebook or MySpace and to see a schedule of her upcoming performances, go here.