Paula Fong is a musician’s musician. She’s made her mark on classic music, Chinese opera, acapella, and choir — and with her new album Chestnut Mare, Fong has turned to folk music. A member of Abby Posner’s band, Fong has made her solo debut with a sound that incorporates the ’60s folk singers of Greenwich Village. “Chestnut Mare,” the album’s title track, uses lyrics written by her mother.
““Back when I first started writing music my mother gave me a handful of poems that she wrote and said ‘“’Do whatever you want with these. Get inspiration, set them to music, whatever you feel like.’ I read through them all and one of them stuck out to me as particularly lovely and lyrical,” Fong explains. “I was particularly struck by how my mother’s words seemed to resonate with me in a way that felt so natural that it was easy to sing them. At the time I was taking a class at Berklee that was exploring open tunings on the guitar and I also wanted to branch into playing further up the neck into different voicings. I put together a chord progression, and I had the rhythmic repetitious feel of Iron and Wine’s meditative ‘Naked As We Came’ in my head when I came up with the picking pattern.”
The video highlights the incredible beauty of Topanga, shot and edited by Ian McIntire. For Fong, the landscape fit seamlessly with “Chestnut Mare.”
“On the drive to the shoot I had the recorded version of the song on repeat so I could study exactly where the entrances and phrasing had been captured and as I got closer to the park entrance, the city streets began to transition to small backcountry roads. The trees that lined the road were thick and green with the sunlight flashing through the leaves. As I drove I felt this incredible sense of peace. The sound of the song became all consuming as it swept over me and I felt completely lost in the music and my surroundings. I know many songwriters fall in love with their own music,” she jokes, “but I tend to be hard to satisfy in that area – constantly consumed with chasing a better sound – so that moment of real connection to a piece that had come through me was encouraging and inspiring. I hope that it touches other listeners in a similar and lovely way.”