Folk legend Judy Collins tells the story of her life in her songs

Collins will perform at the Jane Pickens Theater in Newport on August 15 and 16, the Payomet Performing Arts Center in North Truro, Massachusetts on August 19, and Tanglewood in Lenox, Massachusetts on August 30, with the Indigo Girls, Rufus Wainwright and Lucy Wainwright Roche. I recently called Collins at her New York home to talk about her tour, her life experiences and her latest work. Here’s where the conversation took us.

Q You have four shows coming up in New England. What will you bring to Rhode Island?

A. Oh God, well, first of all, I’m going to bring myself. (laughs) I have the current album “Spellbound” (2022) with my own songs. I will certainly sing some of them, but of course I will also sing some of the hits. I never do the same show twice.

Q You just missed the Newport Folk Festival. You’ve played there many times with many different artists.

A. Sometimes they invite you, sometimes they don’t. But, oh God, often. The first time was probably in 1963. I was there with Joan Baez (2009). I was there (2019) with Brandi Carlile. I sang “Suite: Judy Blue Eyes” with some wonderful guys (including Robin Pecknold of Fleet Foxes, James Mercer of The Shins, and Fruit Bats aka Eric Johnson, backed by stars like Jason Isbell and Benmont Tench of Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers).

Q And Brandi Carlile also played Newport with Joni Mitchell a few years ago, when Joni returned. Have you had any contact with Mitchell since her aneurysm in 2015?

A. Oh yeah. I’m so proud of her. It’s a lot of work, a lot of therapy, and it’s remarkable. I think Brandi had a lot to do with it. Brandi called me and said she was going to Joni’s to try to get Joni to sing. She took a group of singer/songwriters from LA (to Mitchell’s house) and they encouraged Joni.

Q The “Joni Jams,” right. You mentioned Joan Baez – I just interviewed her about her new book of poetry. I asked her about her poem “Judy” for you. Have you read it?

A. I did. It was very touching.

Q She told me that she felt like she wasn’t there for you at first after your son committed suicide. She felt like she needed to reach out to you.

A. Well, relationships between stars are often interesting. It’s about how the sticks fall. I wrote a song about Joan, “Albatross,” on my 1967 album Wildflowers. I don’t know if Joan ever realized I wrote it for her. Maybe she didn’t like it. (laughs) It’s hard to say, but I visited her in Carmel in 1967, went home, wrote the song and recorded it right away. It was my third song ever.

Q What was the trigger for this? Since her retirement, Joan has been very open about her life and has started to write and talk about what happened to her as a child (through abuse) at the hands of her father.

A. As she points out, the trauma is enormous. Now that she’s spoken about it, she said, “I’ve never been happier. I’ve really gotten over it.” It’s like talking about my son’s suicide. You have to talk about it. You have to find a way to deal with it. And it helps other people. So I give Joan credit for talking about it.

You know, when my son died, there were no books about suicide. In 1992, there was nothing on the shelves. Then I wrote a book about suicide (“The Seven T’s” in 2007). And it’s not just me. Today, there are dozens of books about suicide. I respect Joan for speaking out (about her story).

“Albatross” – the lines “And in the night the iron wheels rolled through the rain” – I think it’s a suggestion of grief that isn’t really expressed, but it’s there. I think that was palpable in Joan’s life. She never talked about it, and now she’s talking about it. It’s a freedom to talk. It allows the rest of the planet to talk about it, and that’s urgent.

You know, Joan Rivers called me four days after Clark died – she was in Las Vegas, in her dressing room, getting ready to perform. She had just lost her husband to suicide. I remember it well. I was standing in my studio. She said, “You can’t stop working.” Because I had decided to stop my tour. She said, “If you do that, you’re not going to recover.” I believed her. She said, “There’s no guilt in suicide. You have to work. Work will heal you.” Well, I went into the office and said, “Put them back on. I’m going out.”

Q Do you think it was your salvation?

A. Absolutely. Work saved me. Work always saves me. It has always been that way and it is still that way today.

Q In “Cravings” you also wrote about your eating disorder.

A. My bulimia lasted about 11 years before I got sober – I was bulimic for about three days after I got sober in 1978. Eventually I found the right program. But it’s good that I talked about it. I’m glad I did.

Q Would you like to add anything else to your trip to Rhode Island?

A. I just wanted to tell you that about two months ago I was appointed ambassador for Rocky Mountain National Park in Colorado, and I’m very happy about that. National parks are really in trouble. We need to support them.

Q You grew up in Colorado.

A. I did. And in fact, in 1958, I ran a cabin in the Rocky Mountains on Fern Lake for one summer, baking bread and cakes on a wood stove. My husband chopped the wood and fetched the water. Of course, there was no electricity, just a telephone. That’s my story anyway.

The interview has been edited and shortened.

You can reach Lauren Daley at [email protected]She tweets @laurendaley1.

You can reach Lauren Daley at [email protected]. Follow her on Twitter @laurendaley1.