March 29, 2024

Ruthie Foster

Jan. 16, 2011
Ruthie Foster’s Truthful Music 1/17/11
By Kristi Kates
T he Truth According to Ruthie Foster is the title of
singer-songwriter Ruthie Foster’s new album, songs of which Foster
herself will be bringing to TC’s InsideOut Gallery on Sunday, January
23.
Foster’s life to date has been long, challenging, and full of rich
anecdotes, and she infuses her music with many of those experiences
and influences, from Central Texas to stages and performances across
the U.S. and beyond.
The young Ruthie Foster was surrounded by a wide variety of music,
from the hymns her mother taught her to a book of Beatles songs passed
along by her guitar teacher; to classic country and pop heard through
the family’s radios, to the 45 rpm records her uncle, a trucker, would
drop off during his visits.
“It didn’t matter to me what genre it was,” Foster explains in her
official bio, “I just took it all in as great music.”
She debuted at the age of 14 as a soloist in her uncle’s choir, and in
college crafted her own schedule of classes by day and performance
clubs at night. Soon, she was fronting a blues band that traveled
across Texas - but before too long, Foster started to wonder what else
was out there.
“So I joined the Navy,” she says.

NAVY TO NEW YORK
The pull of music didn’t leave her for long, though. At her helicopter
squadron’s holiday party, she sat in with the band - and was quickly
signed up by Pride, a Navy band that played funk and Top 40 tunes at
Navy recruitment drives. With Foster being the only woman in the
group, she learned quickly, she says, to hold her own on the road,
which would be another important point of growth for this
constantly-learning performer.
From Texas, it was on to New York, where she collaborated with the
city’s songwriters, played at folk venues, and snagged a contract with
Atlantic Records. Another (albeit temporary) roadblock arrived when
Atlantic decreed that she wasn’t the power-ballad singer they’d
envisioned her to be, so Foster retreated back to Texas to deal with
that situation as well as some family issues.

SOULFUL FUTURE
Austin, Texas, is now Foster’s base - and the music has called her
back, as well. She’s now recorded five albums, continually writes
songs, and has performed a plethora of live shows in which she’s been
compared to the likes of Ella Fitzgerald and Aretha Franklin.
On her latest aforementioned album, she worked in Nashville with roots
music producer Chris Goldsmith to oversee her collaborations with a
wide range of musicians, from guitar icon Robben Ford (Bob Dylan/Joni
Mitchell) to Taj Mahal bassist Larry Fulcher, Ben Harper/Tracy Chapman
drummer Rock Deadrick, and one of Aretha Franklin’s own keyboardists,
Jim Dickinson, who’s also worked with the likes of Mudhoney and
Screamin’ Jay Hawkins.
The result of those sessions, The Truth According to Ruthie Foster,
offers songs both big and quiet; the ’70s energy of “Stone Love,” the
reggae rhythms of “I Really Love You,” the funktastic, horn-bedecked
“Dues Paid in Full,” and the downbeat blues of “Tears of Pain” being
just a few.
It’s both a fitting follow-up to Foster’s last release, the
critically-acclaimed The Phenomenal Ruthie Foster, and a standout
showcase for what this soulful, skilled performer’s future will look -
and sound - like.

Ruthie Foster will be performing at InsideOut Gallery in Traverse City
on January 23 at 7:00 p.m. Tickets are $25 in advance, $30 at the
door, $35 reserved, $45 VIP, $20 student; tix available at Cuppa Joe,
Sound It Out Records, Oryana, Borders, InsideOut Gallery, and online
at treatickets.com. For more information on Foster, visit
www.ruthiefoster.com and www.bluecornmusic.com.

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