Maria Tecce’s seductive Vida for Town Hall

Date Published: {J}

American jazz singer Maria Tecce brings her acclaimed show Viva, featuring Argentinian and Spanish songs, Italian arias, jazz, and the poetry of Pablo Neruda, to the Town Hall Theatre on Saturday, November 28.

The former Galway resident, who is now based in Dublin where she also has a busy acting career, has been singing from a very young age.

“When I was a kid my mom was always singing in the house,” says Boston born Maria. “She was a classical pianist. All of us played instruments – all the kids – and we all played and sang. It was a little Italian Von Trapp family! We were always playing at reunions and stuff like that.”

Despite this background, Maria didn’t plan a career as a professional musician.“To be honest with you I never thought of making my living through music, at all,” she explains. “I wanted to be a veterinarian; I wanted to ride horses, when I was a kid. I didn’t have any notions of becoming a professional musician; it just happened when I came over to Ireland.

“I came here about nine years ago now, “Maria continues. “And it was just a way of picking up extra money. I really like Irish music, the whole sitting down and playing and having jam sessions, which was very similar to what I grew up with in folk and blues.”

Returning to Galway with this show has a special resonance for Maria, who had her first paid work as a singer in the town.

“My first gig was the best gig, I think, I’ve ever had,” she recalls. “It was in Nimmo’s Wine Bar. It was every Sunday night, I played for an hour and I sat in the corner with my little Spanish guitar and sang songs. And I got 40 pounds and my dinner and as much wine as I could drink. Great gig!” With an accomplished band backing her up, the singer’s latest show was described by The Irish Times as “seductive”, and given that Maria is such a theatrical performer, this is a show that promises to enliven the senses.

“Viva was inspired by a poem by Pablo Neruda, called Me Gustas Cuando Callas,” Maria explains. “I’d studied Spanish when I was in high school; I loved the language. I started collecting songs in Italian and Spanish, and it was the music of the language that attracted me most; the sensuality, the fecundity and the stories of these songs.”

Maria is also influence by artists like Carmen McCrae, Joni Mitchell and Annie Lennox. Recently, she’s been expanding her tastes further.

“I’ve been influenced by opera lately too,” she says. “It’s all about telling stories, the drama and theatricality of opera. It’s about love and sex and death and all sorts of juicy stuff like that!”Maria Tecce’s other career as an actor means her schedule is pretty hectic, but it’s something she enjoys.

“This year was a great year for me as far as acting goes. I did a film with Jack L, which was great fun. That’s called I Love Musicals. Then I did an encore performance of [Hugh Leonard’s] Roman Fever, in Bewley’s Café theatre

.“The acting has been very good for me, and I learn a bit more each time I do it,” she adds. “I’m not a trained musician; I’m not a trained actor. The way I’ve learned is just by doing.”

Is juggling two busy careers not a strain?

“No, I don’t find it difficult at all,” she states. “I find they dovetail quite easily. There’s a conflict in projects coming up in March so we’ll see what see what happens. I tend to think that these things work themselves out, they go the way they’re supposed to go.”

Maria finds that the disciplines of acting and singing can complement each other.

“I do think it comes from a similar impulse,” she says. “For me the catalyst in singing is the music; in acting I have the text. In songs you have the text as well, but you also have the music as an extra catalyst. But I think there’s musicality in language as well; and if you’re lucky and you get a great writer, like Hugh Leonard, there’s so much musicality in his language that it’s a joy to play the role.”

So far this year Maria Tecce has had a month’s run in the Edinburgh Fringe Festival, as well as playing shows in Dubrovnik, Prague, Paris, Amsterdam, London and New York. Where do all these gigs come from?

“I do all my own booking,” explains the singer. “I don’t have a manager, I do everything myself. It’s a lot of administrative work; I’d be more than happy to hand it over to someone who wanted to do my bookings. That would be the best thing since sliced bread, but it’s not going to happen anytime soon that I see.”

Being your own boss allows a certain freedom but it can have its price artistically.

“It does take a lot of my energy and it does take a lot of hours,” says Maria. “If I had my way I’d devote more energy to the creative side of things, where I could develop more music or another show, or I could try to find money to record my next album. There are lots of little hats to be worn and the last thing I get to do sometimes is step on stage.

“I think it has its pros and cons, like any job,” Maria says about her career. “It is insecure, inconsistent – sometimes – but I’ve lots of friends who’ve lost their jobs recently. The benefit of it is to do something I love, something I have passion for. Once I step on stage all the problems, anything, it all falls away. I can lose myself in the music and that is a gift; it’s a gift I could never put a price tag on.”

Maria Tecce’s love for what she does comes through in her winning performances, and Viva is a show well worth catching.“I feel like the luckiest woman in the world some days, I really do,” she says. “It’s tough, and I wouldn’t recommend it anyone, but if it’s in your heart and you can’t live without it, you have to do it.”

Maria Tecce plays the Town Hall Theatre on Saturday, November 28 at 8pm. Tickets €18/€16 from www.tht.ie or 091-569777.