ESZTER BALINT
Eszter Balint has deep family roots in the arts. She has continued this creative legacy with a unique and varied career of her own. She first gained wide exposure playing Eva in the Jim Jarmusch classic film Stranger Than Paradise. She was also featured in Steve Buscemi’s Trees Lounge, and she worked alongside Mia Farrow and John Malkovich in Woody Allen’s Shadows and Fog.
Eszter is an accomplished singer, violinist, and songwriter who has played with a wide rage of legendary musicians. She currently has three solo albums released with producer JD Foster, including the well-received Airless Midnight. She recently wrote and was set to perform in the musical I Hate Memory! at New York’s Dixon Place before its postponement due to the coronavirus lockdown.
Interview by Tyler Nesler
You come from a family with pretty deep roots in art and performance. Your father Stephan Balint was a co-founder of the experimental Squat Theatre and your grandfather was the Hungarian artist Endre Balint.
As a kid you were a performer in the Squat Theatre, then you were immersed in the downtown New York art and music worlds in the late seventies and early eighties. With all of the different aspects of the arts you were exposed to, why do you think you ended up primarily gravitating to music?
Deep roots in the arts indeed, going back several generations even to my great grandfather. But I also have some history with music specifically. My mother played piano and harp when she was young, and she signed me up for violin and music theory lessons when I was just six or seven. And my secret passion was always singing, since I was little.
I became the house DJ as a teenager, when our theater on 23rd Street was “dark” and we hosted concerts. I was a huge music fan devouring all the incredible music around me. In my later teens and early twenties I worked as the musical director for the theater pieces. I also studied classical singing for a few years.
So at some point my natural passion for music just kicked into high gear, at a time when I was a bit lost, searching for something real to connect to. I was living in Los Angeles through a disappointing lonely time and devoting myself to music really helped. I was trying to figure out who I was beyond all my history and baggage. A lot of extraordinary things “happened” to me growing up; acting, performing in theater and film. But devoting myself to music was a completely autonomous decision, based on pure love, of music and words, no happenstance. So in some ways it is the truest of my pursuits.
Your main instrument is the violin. When did you first begin to play it? Did you initially learn to play any other instruments, and if so what do you think ultimately drew to the violin?
I started classical violin classes very early as a little kid and studied off an on for about ten years. Then I put the instrument down for a long time. When I formed my first band in L.A. I thought at last I can put all those years of torturous practice to good use. And I was curious to learn a bit more about incorporating a fiddling style, which was new to me. I came more from a classical foundational training. I never formally studied any other instrument. But I did teach myself basic guitar and some very rudimentary piano skills.
Your performance style with the violin is sometimes fierce, with brief bursts of fast exuberant playing (as seen in the video for the song "Trouble You Don't See"). How did you come to develop this style? Any violinists in particular who inspired it?
Not violinists specifically. But the general influence of the No Wave aesthetics and energy I grew up around is in there. I like to challenge the conventional “pretty” sound of the violin, which is so mournful, a bit nostalgic. I like contrast. The violin is where I can let my punk disruptive sensibilities loose a bit.
But it’s not just a conceptual choice. There is something about my physical relationship to the instrument where I feel compelled to dig in a bit more aggressively at times; it’s a visceral thing.
As a lyricist you take a strong storytelling and character approach. Would you say that the ways you explore the pathos of your characters is rooted in your background in theatre and acting? Who is one songwriter that has been a big influence for you?
I appreciate you saying that, thank you. Yes very much so; I believe there is a relationship there indeed, a connection between my theater background, my acting, my work in cinema, and the story/character sensibility of my writing in songs. I want to create a story, an experience, a moment, paint a scene with each song. This feels like familiar territory.
As far as influential songwriters, it is so difficult to name one or even twenty. All the usual suspects. The way Randy Newman can tell a story, paint a picture, create the voice of a character in a song was both inspiring and influential to me as a writer. I love a good character, a slightly unreliable narrator. I also love songs which are rich in atmosphere, which evoke cinematic visuals.
You've toured and recorded with a wide range of other musicians, such as Tom Waits’ guitarist Marc Ribot and his band Ceramic Dog, Dayna Kurtz, John Lurie's Marvin Pontiac persona, and Michael Gira's projects Swans and Angels of Light.
How do you think all of this collaboration has helped your own development as a songwriter and performer? What's been one of the more challenging or instructive collaborative experiences for you?
I’m really lucky to have worked with some of my favorite artists. I’m proud of my work with Michael Gira, who I really respect as an artist. And I’ve been performing for a good number of years with my friend Tammy Faye Starlite who is just so brilliant and funny. Chris Cochrane has played guitar with me for the better part of twenty years now; he has such a special way of relating to his instrument which has inspired me.
But I would say that touring with Marc Ribot and Ceramic Dog stands out as one of the more educational musical experiences I’ve had. It was very demanding, both musically and in terms of risk, so it was an advanced course in learning. It reminded me that there is a beautiful ease which you can relax into when you’re surrounded by high level musicianship, even when the task at hand is quite challenging.
It also reminded me of something else I already innately knew, but can sometimes forget; that when you go further emotionally, it can always help you meet all kinds of demands. When all else fails, just be soulful. It’s not a trick of course, passion doesn’t respond well to force. But you can always seek a deeper personal connection to playing, and be available to receive it, even if the material is difficult. This is not always enough to overcome all other obstacles, and it’s not a substitute for discipline, but it is always available and always helpful, no matter the circumstance. I got to witness the power of that nightly while working with those guys; that was a helpful instruction to me in my own work.
JD Foster produced your three albums Flicker, Mud, and Airless Midnight. How did this working relationship come about? What do you think are some distinctive sensibilities that he brought to each album?
We hit it off right away when we first met, which was through his then wife Lisa Rinzler, the cinematographer on Trees Lounge. We had a lot of shared musical sensibilities and musical references. When I set out to make my first album he had just come off producing the Richard Buckner album Devotion and Doubt which I loved. So I asked him to work with me.
He is so naturally musical and creative; we both like to explore, play — try shit out, as they say. I think we also both gravitate towards earthy sounds, although that’s a bit of a generalization. I believe we share a deep appreciation for the “song.” But I’d say he steered me early on in this direction, towards really finding where the song is, due to his vast experience with songwriters. He is also a very intuitive musician and I believe I am too, but it took me longer to get in touch with my own intuitiveness because I was newer at this and filled with insecurities; working with him helped me with that.
I love having someone to bounce ideas off of and over the years and three albums this shared musical understanding has evolved. Ultimately that playful collaborative spirit, sharing in the process of realizing a song is what a “producer” means to me. I have a lot of ideas about how I want my work to sound and have considered producing my own albums. But there is something I really treasure about having a dialogue and someone I can trust to check in with, when I lose perspective; that’s such a valuable asset.
Airless Midnight - Red Herring Records
How do you think you have evolved musically over your three albums to date? Has your approach to songwriting taken any unexpected paths for you since you released your first album?
I am less afraid of telling a story now, of being perceived as “conventional” and less afraid of simplicity. I was a little petrified of those things early on, which is a classic rookie mistake for some. I was worried about being too “pretty.” Or having a narrative in my song that people can actually understand, ha. I’m less so now. I also feel that with each album I’m more devoted to the song. I have become much more of a “song” person over the years.
I have gained confidence in myself as a songwriter and musician. I still have great fits of insecurity which I have to ride like waves, don’t get me wrong, and with each new project there is a bit of going back to almost zero. Still, my experience has brought me to an overall more peaceful and easeful place.
I have specifically become a better singer, I’d say. It’s an endless and endlessly curious, sometimes painful exploration; there’s no way I have arrived to some “there.” But I’ve been able to carve out and access a bit more freedom in my singing over the years.
But it’s funny, the other answer to this question is that I can also recognize some pretty steady, unchanging, core orientation points in my work. In some fundamental ways my aesthetics have not changed all that much.
You recently wrote the "anti-musical" I Hate Memory! which was due to premiere at Dixon Place in New York in March 2020 but has unfortunately been postponed due to the coronavirus lockdown. It's billed as a "reluctant memoir."
Was producing a memoir as a musical just a more comfortable or unconventional way for you to write one? What do you see as a benefit to producing a memoir for the stage as opposed to taking the more typical path of writing a book?
It started as a vague “let’s do something” idea with Stew. And that something was always going to be something musical, and most likely somewhat theatrical because I have that in my background and Stew has that in his present. We admired each other’s work and history, I was a big Stew fan so I jumped at the opportunity to collaborate.
He proposed doing something about my life growing up in New York, since it was such an extraordinary circumstance, and that era in New York is such a hot topic of endless curiosity for people nowadays. For good reasons, mind you. We started with writing the songs, which grew out of a lot of conversations. The songs are really the essence of the piece, the bones of the whole thing.
As for why not a book: I wanted to make a living breathing thing, a playful creation, and committing it to the page feels a little more constrained, like you’re solidifying your “story” and caging it. That’s a very subjective perspective, I know there are excellent memoirs out there. But I personally struggle with this concept of a memoir, and so the idea of a theatrical musical creation feels freer to me, less pinned down. Also, I happen to sing. And play music. And write songs. And I love playing with a band. So it made sense to fuse those loves with the story at hand.
Photo by Peter Yesley
How accurate versus how tongue-in-cheek is the title I Hate Memory? You've had a long career and you've worked with many unique people, but do you think there is something ultimately exasperating or too egocentric about memoirs? Do you worry about getting too caught up in the past?
Yes and yes!! It’s a little bit accurate and very much tongue-in-cheek. We can’t hate the idea of memory. But I personally had great difficulty with both aspects; talking about myself, and staring into the past.
As you suggest, I find the “memoir” genre a bit irritating and egocentric sometimes. Again, I don’t know why — there have been many wonderful ones. But for me the idea evokes a kind of self-obsession that I am uncomfortable with. Everybody wants to write their memoir! (Hey, that could be an alternate title to the show!)
And my dread about looking too long and hard into the past is at least a little bit healthy, I think. I don't want to over-romanticize the past, I don’t want to blame it, be a victim of it, and I don’t want to be stuck back there. But since I’m telling stories which took place in the past, and which can reverberate and have significance in the present, and stories which involve me, well to some extent there was no way around it, I had to face these struggles. So I dealt with it by giving voice to them in the show, in a hopefully irreverent and playful way.
As for the title, there is something punk about calling it an anti-musical, a bit like the title. And that punk spirit feels right. I’m not a musical theater kind of person as you can imagine, yet this is a show built around songs. So anti-musical is just right. When it was a smaller scale project, with mostly just the songs and a little bit of interstitial text, Stew and I called it an anti-cabaret. I always want to avoid and defy labels. So this is my way of doing that yet again. It has outgrown its anti-cabaret status, perhaps in its next incarnation after this current one it will be an anti-opera!
I Hate Memory! is directed by Lucy Sexton, with musical direction by David Nagler and songs co-written with Stew. How did you happen to work with these accomplished figures, and how long did it take you all to develop this project?
When Stew suggested doing something I didn’t hesitate. I felt a great affinity with his sensibilities. We wrote songs very well together, and even with the few songs I wrote mostly alone I always had the idea of sending them to him for edits, revisions, or just feedback; his creative spirit was behind all of it and a big motivator. Stew’s imagination and intelligence are such an inspiration.
Lucy is a good friend, and our personal connection means a lot to me, especially for this work which is so personal. She knows me, sees me as a whole person: mother, friend, an artist she respects. It is entirely mutual, I also respect her greatly and we also have so much shared sensibility. I was a big DanceNoise fan in the eighties. I appreciated their physical humor, their sense of the absurd, their playfulness and their fierce, radical sensibility. There was a kind of slapstick performance-art feel to their work that I loved. The DanceNoise pieces I’ve seen in more recent years have been fuller and richer in scope in some ways than the earlier works I had seen, so moving, while still retaining the same playful humorous spirit. Lucy is also very knowledgeable about the New York arts scene all around and specifically about the period this show covers too; she knows the characters who surface, and the theater I grew up in. So it’s a natural and easy fit.
David covers a lot of ground, he is such an intelligent songwriter and a great versatile musician, and those multi-instrumentalists are always an amazing asset! He has performed musical director duties before, and I needed someone with that experience. He is also just an all around wonderful human, by the way, which matters. As is everyone in this show. The band is a treasure, all so talented with a fantastic personal presence which was very important to me. And the amazing singer/bassist/performer Felice Rosser and Tammy (Faye Starlite) are also involved. I’m pretty floored at the talent we’ve assembled and all they’re bringing to this. Tal Yarden is doing visuals and he’s another kindred artistic spirit full of invention. We had all been working super hard, running on pure magical collaborative energy to the end. So that last minute pandemic cancellation just before opening was definitely crushing. But I can’t wait to resume.
You're often asked about your well-known role in Jim Jarmusch's 1984 film Stranger Than Paradise, however you've had many other screen acting roles since then, including co-starring with David Bowie and Rosanna Arquette in the little known 1991 film The Linguini Incident (aka Shag-O-Rama).
I had never heard of this film and it was a surprise because I thought I knew all of Bowie’s film roles. What was it like working with a music legend in an apparently less than legendary film? Did the mostly unfavorable reviews it originally received surprise you? Was it at least a fun experience to make?
It’s not a film I’m especially proud of when it comes to my own work so that keeps me from talking about it. It almost makes me wince a bit now. But the spirit around the filming was wonderful; I recall the experience with fondness. I think it got a tough break; it was released on the day of the L.A. riots and it’s a comedy, pretty light fare, so there was no way it was going to gain any traction. But I’m grateful to the filmmakers for casting me, and even if it didn’t quite translate there was heart there and there are some scenes where that shines through. I think the caper aspect and the absurd comic aspect just never quite gelled into a cohesive whole. That happens. But I have great memories of everyone who worked on it.
Meeting and working with Bowie was a highlight of my life. No question. I was so starstruck but as I recall he was fun, easy to talk to, supremely intelligent, with a great sense of humor, curious and open and kind. I mean you can never get quite that comfortable and cozy with someone with that much legend status baggage but I loved spending time around him during the filming and feel so lucky I got to have that experience.
I have never felt so shaken by a “celebrity” passing as I did about his. Maybe John Lennon was close. I can’t explain it. I’m not usually shaken up by celebrity deaths. I don't know if it’s because I knew him a bit and liked him so much, or because I couldn’t conceive of a world without Bowie’s artistic presence in it somewhere, or both.
Do you have any near future plans to release a fourth solo album? Will there be a release of a recording for I Hate Memory?
I need to start thinking of something new during this down time, but I’ve been so invested in this show and it takes me a while to switch gears. I’m not fast that way. The songs from this show will need to live as an album for sure. And while Stew is not in its current incarnation, he will definitely be a part of the recording.
Check for updates and more on Eszter’s site and on Dixon Place’s page for I Hate Memory!
Main page photo by Peter Yesley
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Tyler Nesler is a New York City-based freelance writer and the Founder and Managing Editor of INTERLOCUTOR Magazine.
