Mary Gauthier: A Lifetime of Mercy

Mary Gauthier

The writer of one of the best songs released in this century tells her story of abandonment, awakening, redemption, and renewal, which surrounds and brings dimensions to her classic “Mercy Now.”

Mary Gauthier is an heir apparent to the best songwriters of the last 150 years, going back to Stephen Foster. But beyond traditional folk or pop music, she embodies the spirit of Hank Williams and Woody Guthrie and the likes of Robert Johnson. She’s like Bob Dylan turned inside out where no phantoms or mystery riders can roam. For her, with due respect to Dylan,

In our recent phone interview, she talked about being a songwriter as a calling. If this is so, then who is calling her. Who is it that calls us to reveal our deepest, most guarded hearts. Her story—which has come through her songs—her generous performances, and her book, Saved by a Song, savors and cooks her truth low and slow like the best southern cooking she has championed. The story she tells through songs and writing is captured well in the words of the poet, Rilke, with no small thanks to Ray Wylie Hubbard:

Our fears are like dragons guarding our most precious treasures.

The story of Mary Gauthier is the release of those guarded fears and the transformation of our suffering into her precious treasures of stories and songs. Arlo Guthrie has said “It’s only during the last 100 years that we stopped telling our own stories.” Mary Gauthier’s work is an open invitation to tell our stories, not to empty hearts but to the loving fires of our constantly burning need for meaning and righteousness. This rings especially true in these troubled times. She offers a remedy through the healing power of authenticity through songs and stories.

Few singer-songwriters over the last few decades have emerged from the American-roots music scene with as strong ties to past legends as Mary Gauthier. On hearing her the first time, it’s impossible to avoid her connection to the best songwriters of the last 100 years.

While she has always maintained her original voice—witnessing her legacy over the last 20 years—echoes the finest singer-songwriters of the ’60s and ’70s of last century. She is an old-school singer-songwriter in the tradition of John Prine, Iris Dement, Rodney Crowell, and Janis Ian.

Mary in concert.

One of the major influences on Gauthier’s work is, notably, John Lennon. So, what would a country-based New Orleans native songwriter have in common with the former Beatle gone now for nearly 45 years? In her book she spends a chapter highlighting John Lennon’s song, “Mother,” from his 1970 solo album, John Lennon/Plastic Ono Band. The now classic album set the bar for raw emotional authentic exposure through music. Lennon’s spirit runs through Gauthier’s spare instrumentation and willingness to be vulnerable to each moment in song. Like John Lennon, the song-journey of Mary Gautier is captivating and inspiring.

Great songwriters do not become this simply because they want to or because we need them to be extraordinary. Like all unique artists they are formed by lives riddled with chance, that dance with fate lined with tragedy; at times they dance with near death and eventually find redemption and rebirth. The songwriters of Mary Gauthier’s kind become alchemists turning the poisons of life into songs that often seem to be delivered by the thunder of heaven. Mary Gauthier is such a songwriter.

In our phone interview, Gauthier expanded on her sense of calling, “My music comes from my story. I’m in recovery and alive. I can stay that way by writing songs that get down to the core. The songs have filled a void.”

Gauthier began life in 1962 in New Orleans, born to a mother who gave her up to Saint Vincent’s Women and Infants Asylum. As she describes in her story, the place was nearly as cryptic as its name. She was adopted by Barbara and Joe Gauthier, an Italian-American Catholic couple. Her family was flawed by an alcoholic father and a distant mother. They also adopted a son. Both siblings grew through this troubled family. Mary left home early and made her way through the streets of New Orleans. It was a time in her life where she was making her way through the jungle of an inner city known for it’s dark-edged culture. As a gay youth, life was hard, but she found her way to the music as it drew her in. Alcohol and drugs nearly destroyed her, but she was saved as she titled her book, by a song. The song was a life of sobriety that went beyond drugs and alcohol and into her addiction to love and romance. She would eventually find who she was and become comfortable with herself. The songs became an illustration of this side of her story.

Mary Gauthier’s excellent book, Saved by a Song.

After nearly 30 years of performance, albums of original songs, and a book called Saved by a Song thread through Mary’s cycle of songs and stories, which is clear within her work. Her art emerges from inside stories, songs, and characters chock full of nuance, complications, hard dues-paid, loss, regret, and an ultimate, transcendent blessing. It all flows from lessons learned over a lifetime, a result of the trauma of adoption. In the end, it leads to a life fulfilled under the constant guidance of grace and mercy. It comes through in the songs.

While these themes stream throughout all her work, it is most intensely captured in 2011’s The Foundling, her landmark album, which chronicles her experience searching for her birth mother. One of her keys songs that describes the universal feeling of abandonment experienced by adopted children is called “Lonely.”

Born a bastard child in New Orleans
to a woman I’ve never seen
I don’t know if she ever held me
All I know is that she let go of me

I passed thru like thunder
I passed thru like rain
Passed out from under
Good-bye could have been my family name.

Mary Gauthier & Jaimee Harris will be in San Diego on April 25.

It is the process Gauthier illustrates in her 2023 book, Saved by a Song, that allows the reader to accompany her as she creates songs like the now universally loved, “Mercy Now” and “Dark Enough to See the Stars.” The journey becomes vital with the audiobook. Hearing her voice as she tells the stories and sings key songs enhances the authenticity and integrity of her art. The personal work that includes many risks grows from something singular to a universal experience. Her chapters in the book take us down the road that goes from a song of surrender and confession, “I Drink.” Then we move to “Mercy Now.” The now classic song has been covered by Kathy Mattea, Bobby Bare, Candi Staton, and Mike Farris. It also found its way to ’80s pop icon, Boy George whose version pleased her. The song is now 20 years old as of February 15 of this year. It was released with the album of the same name in 2005. According to Gauthier in 2014, her most requested song was named “One of the saddest 40 country songs of all time” by Rolling Stone magazine. But she disputes this, saying emphatically, “It is not a sad song. It is about hope.” Indeed, it is about getting to the core of the heart of forgiveness for us and each other. Perhaps, one day, Rolling Stone will do a poll that will reveal “Mercy Now “as one of the most important and best songs of its time.

The chapter of the book titled “Mercy Now” walks us through the steps, missteps, revisions, and breakthrough of the song as it moves from Gauthier’s personal view with verses about the struggles of her father and brother, to the church, country, humanity, and the universe as she prays in song for mercy. There is a modern hymn-like trance feel to the song.

“Mercy Now” mirrors her life as she moves from her struggles with addiction to substances and romantic relationships. As she tells her stories and creates her songs, personal flaws come up, which she confronts like a determined alchemist; her songs become works of art ready for others to find healing. The universal appeal of “Mercy Now” resonates on an intimate and personal level. This is the miracle of this song. But, the song was one step away from a constant journey through the redemption of music. Over the years she has shown how the best recovery comes through being of service to others. This is illustrated in the series of songs she wrote with former soldiers wounded physically in combat and emotionally by trauma. Her album, Rifles and Rosaries, allowed her to co-write songs with soldiers. It was made possible by a program called Songwriting with Soldiers. It is just one example of how one artist who has been driven to a life in songs has been able to lead others to healing through the power and the grace of music.

Mary Gauthier with guest Jaimee Harris will be making an appearance at an intimate house concert this month.

Friday, April 25, 6pm, Palo Verde House Concerts in the Rolando area, hosted by Michael Rennie. For tickets, click here: https://www.simpletix.com/e/house-concert-mary-gauthier-with-guest-jai-tickets-206122