01/11/2009

The Toy Hearts Interview: Sophia Johnson

The Toy Hearts are a Birmingham-based group who play some superbly uplifting bluegrass and western swing. Consisting of several Johnson family members - Sisters, Hannah (lead vocal/mandolin) and Sophia (guitar/harmony vocals) and their father, Stewart (banjo/dobro). Their history is one of pure dedication the their musical craft and the UK's burgeoning bluegrass scene, with dad's involment stretching back to the 60's. The group's recent album was the critically acclaimed 'When I Cut Loose', however, there's a new one on its way. Here's a few questions we set for Sophia -

Early on you singled out Django Reinhardt and Clarence White as particular influences. What is it about them that's so inspirational?

Django has incredibly inventive melodic phrasing; his attack and technical skill struck me right away, the perfect demonstration of tension and release. His melodies are so beautiful, they can still make me cry and his improvisational skills blow my mind – I listen to Django records in wonder and awe. I liked the romance and mystery of his life story as well- a gypsy who had to relearn his technique after being badly burned, and how this ‘limitation’ meant he developed a totally unique style that defines a whole genre. Genius.

Clarence got to me because of his timing – some times he just plays straight across the bar lines. Also, I love the fact that on some of the old recordings he is actually overloading the microphone – his flat picking is like a machine gun! Plus, he is one of the first real lead guitarists in a bluegrass band and his style of playing influenced a lot of really great guitarists who followed– Tony Rice being one of them.

It must have been a thrill to be the first British female to be featured in Flatpicking Guitar Magazine recently. As a woman, do you think it's been more difficult to receive recognition for your playing?

It was the fulfillment of an ambition I’ve had since I started Flatpicking – I subscribe to the magazine and to be featured in it alongside all my favourites was a real honour – I was bouncing off the walls for several weeks when I found out.

As far as recognition goes - it’s a great way to be recognized if you’re the only guitarist in a skirt! However, I think it is harder to actually be taken seriously. I want to be ‘good for a guitarist’ not ‘good for a girl’. I find the ‘good for a girl’ comment quite difficult and I used to find it hard to know how to respond. I am now a lot more confident and I will challenge people if they say that to me, but I have also gotten used to the fact that the majority of the general public have not seen a girl play as hard or fast as I can – and they don’t mean to be rude - they are just genuinely surprised! However, after people have seen me play a few times, I hope they can get over the shock of how I look, and just listen to my playing. I used to shy away from the spotlight a little bit, but I am now embracing the fact that I am a 27 yr old British Girl, who plays a mixture of bluegrass and swing, on a Martin Guitar, wearing a dress and 4 inch heels. That’s who I am and there’s no point me trying to be anything else!

Have you met many of your guitar idols?

The fantastic thing about bluegrass is that all of the musicians are really accessible – I have not only met but also picked with some of the best flatpickers: Andy Falco, Cody Kilby, Josh Williams, Chris Eldridge, Tony Watt, Justin Carbone, Kenny Smith, Tim Stafford. I have also been lucky enough to meet such great musicians as Tim O’brein, Del McCoury, Ricky Skaggs and Peter Rowan. I would really like to meet Tony Rice – I saw him play at IBMA last year with Mountain Heart, which was incredible. I would also like to meet Bryan Sutton. Of course – I’m a few generations too late to meet Django and Clarence though!

Your music takes you to a lot of places. Is it better or worse travelling as a family?

Its definitely a double edged sword. We are a very tight unit the three of us, and we know each other inside out – but that also makes our relationship very intense. We are all very passionate people of an ‘artistic temprament’, so when sparks fly it’s a real firework display! However, we are much better now at giving each other space and also we have learned to let things go that aren’t really important. Travelling together can be tough; we love each other very much, but that means we say things to each other that we wouldn’t dare say to anyone else! Working with your family is a blessing and a curse – but it must be more of a blessing otherwise we wouldn’t all keep doing it!

Is there currently anybody else involved? Or any plans for more instruments?

The core of The Toy Hearts will always be myself, dad and Hannah, we write the material and make all the decisions – we couldn’t go on stage without one of us. Bass players and fiddle players have tended to come and go over the years, however, Howard Gregory has been playing fiddle with us for our UK shows since the beginning and we really enjoy working with him. We use different people depending where we are geographically, and we used to find this hard but now we actually enjoy it. For example, we love going to Texas as it means we get to play with our good friend Ray Cargo on bass, equally when we’re in France we will often have Raphael Maillet on fiddle. I just bought a ‘58 Gibson ES125 , I’m hoping we will be working this into the set. Dad would love to get his ‘53 Fender twin neck steel guitar out as well, so we may be doing a slightly more electric swing thing in the future.

http://toyhearts.co.uk

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