Sylvia: Looking Back… And Looking Forward

March 9, 1983 is a date that will stay etched into Sylvia’s mind forever. It was on that night that she was named the Top Female Vocalist in Country Music by the Academy of Country Music (ACM). Even though she was in the midst of a run at the top of the charts with songs such as “Drifter,” “Heart On The Mend,” and the million-selling “Nobody,” she admits that hearing Ricky Skaggs and actress Catherine Bach announce her name from the stage was a surprise.

“That was hard to believe. The year before, I had been nominated for Top New Female Vocalist, and had a nomination on the American Music Awards. I’d had a few nominations, but I had never won anything. That was a big award. I was very surprised and didn’t expect to win. When I got up there, I truly was stunned. I think I said something like ‘I’m not used to winning’ or something silly like that. I didn’t know what to say. I thanked some people like the record label, and the fans. It didn’t feel real. It was like I was living in a dream. She tells Sounds Like Nashville that was definitely a moment that she cherishes to this day. “There’s something about being recognized by your peers that is really important to us human beings. From an ego standpoint, it felt as if I’d been ‘let into the music family.’ I had always dreamed of being a part of that family, so it was a great feeling.”

Music was always the driving factor in her life. Growing up in Kokomo, Indiana, she knew what she wanted to do from an early age. “From the time I was three – literally, being a singer became a conscious thing. Singing was as natural as breathing, eating, and sleeping. I didn’t even know I was doing it. It was second nature. When I realized that people liked to hear me sing, it was an epiphany, and it became what I did. I never had any desire to do anything else. It was always music.”

The singer recalls that she didn’t operate with a back-up plan in mind, one she would go to in case her music career didn’t take off. “There never was a Plan B. It was always so totally clear what I would be doing with my life. I think when there is no doubt within you, somehow that helps. It helps focus your energies. When you’re clear within yourself, other people can sense that clarity, so they come on board with you. When I look back, I can see that. I didn’t at the time. Now that I have some life experience under my belt, I see that there’s something to that. We’re always putting out vibes into the world, and if I have doubts about something – whether I’m conscious of it or not, I’m putting those doubts out into the world. We’re all reading people’s emotional energy all the time. We can sense if someone is sad or happy, and we can sense if a person is feeling confident or lacking confidence. When it’s very clear within yourself what you want to create, I believe this clarity is helpful in moving you toward your goals.”

Moving to Nashville at the end of 1975, she soon found a job working as a secretary for producer Tom Collins, who owned a publishing company with Charley Pride. That job helped her to establish relationships with some of the top tunesmiths in town. “When I began telling the writers who were on staff that I was looking for songs, they were all my friends. Dean Dillon was on staff, Dennis Morgan, Kye Fleming, Don Pfrimmer, and Kent Robbins – some of the best in the business. They would come in, and I’d be sitting there at my desk, and they’d say ‘I’m going in to see Tom with my new song. Do you want to hear it?’ They would play it for me first. When Kye and Dennis wrote ‘Tumbleweed,’ I said ‘That’s mine. Don’t let Tom pitch that to anybody.’ I just knew it fit my voice. That turned out to be my first top ten.”

The hits continued through the end of the 1980s, when a shift in commercial styles began to take shape in Country Music. Undaunted, she continued to plow away at her craft. “I had recorded an independent record in 1996, which was called The Real Story, and I put it out on the Internet, which was still a fairly new way to release music. Independent artists like myself were still trying to figure out how to use the Internet to promote their CDs. There wasn’t much in the way of social media at the time, maybe Myspace, and that was about it. I took that record around to most of the major labels to see if I could get any interest in picking it up. There wasn’t any interest. So, I put it on CDBaby.com and hoped people would find it. And now, CDBaby.com has grown to become one of the best resources for distributing independently recorded music!”

As it turned out, the lack of interest in her new music from the industry led her in a new career direction – one that took her into uncharted territory. “In a lot of ways, I felt I had reached a dead end in my life with music. I didn’t know what to do with what I had recorded. I was at a crossroads, and began to do some real soul searching. I asked myself ‘What am I meant to do if I’m not a singer? Who am I?” It was a true identity crisis. I knew I could probably do something other than music, but I had never thought of myself in any other way than as a singer, entertainer, and performer. I had written some songs, and was beginning to hone my craft as a songwriter. In my soul searching, I realized that one of the things that did matter to me, that gave my life meaning was being of service to others in some way. As I explored what that might look like, I heard about a new profession, life and career coaching. That connected some dots for me. In the 80s and 90s, as I was out there being an artist, I realized that I could have benefited by having had a mentor or a coach. As I learned more about coaching and the skills required, I became interested in finding out how I could do that. I decided to take coach training at the Hudson Institute of Santa Barbara, CA. Offering myself as a coach was a way I could be of real service to others.”

As a successful life coach, she has ended up working with several people that she had crossed paths with before. “That part was really gratifying – and, not just working with other artists, but musicians, songwriters, publishers, theater directors – people in all kinds of creative arts, which has been very interesting for me.”

Still, music has never departed from her inner being, and the singer recently released It’s All In The Family – her first album in fourteen years. An album of twelve heartfelt and meaningful songs (nine of which she is a co-writer) the disc includes the inspiring “Somebody’s Daughter,” which she says has spoken to quite a few in the recent political storm.

“We are in a climate where people have hunkered down and polarized their positions. I think that song might be a helpful reminder that we are all somebody’s daughter or somebody’s son. I think it’s grounding and humbling to be in a practice of remembering that we are not our political positions. Our beliefs are not our identity. I love people. Truly. I don’t care what you believe or whom you voted for. I want to connect with you on a deeper level than just your opinions or what you believe. We’re souls – spirit beings living in these physical bodies for a relatively short time. That’s what I believe. When I am talking with someone, I’m not talking to what they believe. I’m talking to another human being. I think ‘Somebody’s Daughter’ points to a practice of remembering we are all one big human family. I didn’t sing the song from the standpoint of ‘Here’s what you ought to do.’ I sang it as a reminder to myself to stay in the practice of remembering that everyone I meet is a part of my family. Yes, it’s not always easy to do, and not something to believe in – it’s just a practice.”

The new album also allowed her a chance to connect with her Indiana roots. “In the past twenty years or so, I became a member of Ancestry.com, and began digging into my family history out of curiosity. I knew my grandparents, my aunts, uncles, and cousins. But, beyond my grandparents, I really didn’t know much. One of the things I’ve discovered is that there are a lot of invisible factors or missing puzzle pieces that influence who we are. There are belief systems, perspectives and even mannerisms that have been passed down through the generations that we may never have conscious knowledge of unless we become curious to learn who these people were who came before us. ”

In researching her family’s past, she realized that her love of music was indeed genetic. “That knowledge brought me a sense of curiosity about the relatives that I have had contact with – like my grandfather, Connie Kirby, who was a musician. He and my grandmother, Minnie Blankenship Kirby, raised fourteen children, so he was never able to pursue music as a livelihood. He actually shared with me that he was disappointed that none of his children had gone into music professionally, but was proud that his granddaughter had. I wanted to make my musical lineage conscious and real through this new album. I had inherited my grandfather Kirby’s banjo and his fiddle. It was clear to me that I wanted the voices of those instruments to be on this record. There was a dot that I wanted to connect, that my grandfather and his love and passion for music was passed down to me. Who knows? If he had not been a musician, who knows what trajectory my life might have taken? I know that he played a role in my passion for music, and I wanted to honor that.”

With that said, she feels honored to share part of her grandfather’s legacy on the album. “Knowing that those instruments were going to be a part of this record through Stuart Duncan playing his fiddle and John Mock playing his banjo on the intro of “Grandpa Kirby Runnin’ the Hound” – I could feel his joy. As I talk about it now, I feel him smiling down on me, happy that his passion has been brought into this present moment through this new music. That means a lot to me, and I hope to other people, too. I hope this album will inspire people to be curious about their own roots.”

Another highlight from the album is the dreamy “I Didn’t Know What I Was Missing,” a song Sylvia co-wrote with Bobby Tomberlin and Mark Narmore, that Sylvia says is directly inspired by a recent event in her life. “About a year and a half ago, I went through a divorce. I was married twenty-four years, so it was a big change. I’ve described to my friends that I’ve felt as if the whole landscape of my life changed. It was like moving to a foreign country. Everything looked different. You could see it as an awful thing or say ‘Ok, this is a new opportunity. I’m in a new land.’ I chose to look at it that way, and found myself looking at the world in an almost childlike way again! I thought, ‘Oh, my gosh. I’ve got a clear field. I can create anything I want in this next chapter of my life. So, what’s it going to look like?’ By the time I started co-writing songs for this album, I had gone through a lot of the deep grieving and had broken through to this place where life was full of possibility. In lots and lots of ways, I feel this record reflects that sense of possibility. That particular song is a realization that ‘If I don’t climb to the top of the mountain, I’m not going to see the view from up there. If I don’t jump into that ocean of life that it talks about in the first verse, I’ll be sitting on the bank of the river of life – and I want to jump in! That’s what it feels like I’ve done with this record – I’ve jumped back into life with both feet!”

To purchase, It’s All In The Family, visit SylviaMusic.com.