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The healing of Anita Baker. (African American singer).
by Alan Ebert, Dec. 1, 1994
Essence
Anita Baker - eyes closed, heart open - is standing at center stage singing of a summertime when the living was easy. As huge sounds pour from the tiny singer, a hush hovers over the blase performers gathered for rehearsal in Boston's Symphony Hall. Finding notes previously explored by Sarah and Ella, Anita flings her final mournful strains heavenward, and the musicians of the Boston Pops Orchestra respond with a spontaneous, prolonged ovation.
The nearly 3000,0000-strong audience sprawled on the banks of the Charles River for the Pops' annual Fourth of july concert the following evening react similarly. Baker's vocal gymnastics have made the traditional closing fireworks seem redundant and anticlimactic. For the seven-time Grammy Award winner - whose first four albums for Elektra, beginning with Rapture in 1986, have sold 11 million copies in the United States - it is a triumphant return to performing following a three-year absence, during which she gave birth to her sons, Walter and Edward Bridgforth.
In retrospect, that Baker chose Independence Day for her comeback this past summer was fitting, because few artists have fought as passionately to obtain professional and personal independence. As in any battle, however, particularly one waged by a woman of color, Baker has made enemies, and there have been casualties - notably her reputation.
She is known as difficult, and worse. But she has prevailed. Today, despite demons that still torment, she is fully in charge of her career and life. She recently released Rhythm of Love, her first album in three years, and is its executive producer and frequent arranger and composer. On vocals ranging from "Body and Soul" to "My Funny Valentine," what she calls voice,' is richer and deeper, as is the level of her emotional interpretation. At her insistence, her vocal dynamics are no longer compressed by engineering. In short, Rhythm of Love is pure, unadulterated Anita. Of the greater emotionalism in her singing today, day, Baker says, It's my way of conveying to people who and what I am."
In past interviews, Baker has not always been forthright or even truthful about who she really is. Today, however, far from the lakefront home in the exclusive Detroit suburb of Grosse Pointe she shares with her husband of six years, Walter Bridgforth, Jr., she sits in a Boston restaurant and ex@ plains, There were too many difficult questions." She adds softly, suddenly seeming very vulnerable, And too much pain."
To truly understand Anita Baker is to understand her painful beginnings. Now in her mid-thirties, she was 13 when her mother, Mary Lewis, died. At that time she learned, however, that Mary was not her real mother. That shock was followed by another-that she had been abandoned at age 2; and yet another - that her real mother, who had lived down the block all those years, had never shown any interest in meeting her. To cope with this traumatic news, the 13-year-old went into denial. However, Baker the adult was plagued by moodiness, bouts of depression and inexplicable feelings of inadequacy until she finally looked inward. She found the strength to do so in Walter Bridgforth. "His support allowed me to turn Anita Baker." around and face . . . Anita Baker."
With a slight tremble in her voice and a strong will to tell the truth, Baker explains how one day "the pain was just there begging to be examined and released. It was the pain of acknowledging how I felt about my own mother's having given me away. Although I tried to imagine why she did such a thing, I couldn't. And the one person who could explain - my mother - wouldn't.
"She [mother and daughter met when Anita was 16! only said that there was this guy, a sailor. That she was 16, that she soon became pregnant . . .and that she never saw him again. But others tell a different story, so I just don't know. And I need to know. A piece of me feels missing. I look at my sons - such big children, bigger than average - and because Walter and I are smallish people, I wonder, Is this my father I'm seeing in my boys? I want to know. I want to know," she repeats angrily.
She pauses, her youthful face now revealing the weight of emotion. "How does a mother give her child away? How?" she asks again, unable to comprehend, particularly now that she has children of her own. Without the aid of formal therapy, Anita, by delving into her long-repressed feeling, now knows how the 13-year-old child answered that question. Her head turns aside as tears threaten to tumble: "That child believed her mother abandoned her because there was something bad about her," she says. Something terrible that made her unlovable. And until Walter, that is how I felt about me - that I was not good enough. Not good, period."
It was that long-unacknowledged feeling that drove her to seek perfection. Because she didn't feel she was worthy or lovable, she needed her audiences to tell her she was. "Applause felt like approval, and it became a drug that soothed the pain, but only temporarily."
Marriage and motherhood have helped her gain a new understanding and appreciation of Anita Baker. Through my family's love, I now realize that it was not my fault that I was given away. Knowing that has freed me to let go and move on. But the pain remains. It's the demon that frequently raises its head and results in my moodiness."
Although Baker has tried in the past to establish ties to her mother, the women do not have a relationship today. My mother only called when she wanted things. She doesn't know me, so how could she have a feeling for me? Still, I see her each time I pass a mirror. The resemblance shocks me. Someday I'll go back to make a new stab at a relationship, but not yet. Happily, her approval is no longer necessary. No one's is. I'm no longer driven to prove I'm worthy. That war is over, even if there are still days when I have to do battle, she says.
She was taught to do battle early in life by Mary Lewis. Because she was elderly, Lewis knew she would not be around many years to look after Anita. To protect her surrogate child, Lewis raised Anita to be self-sufficient and self-reliant. Anita held down several part-time jobs be@ tween school and church, where she sang in the choir.
Audiences began responding to Baker long before Rapture. She started singing in clubs at 16. At 18 she joined Chapter 8, a band that was "making noise" in Detroit until its record label folded. After that Baker worked as a cook, waitress and receptionist for two years. A phone call in brought her to Los Angeles to record her first album, Songstress. To promote it, she toured key cities, opening for Frankie Beverly. As the venues changed from joints,, to 3,000-seat theaters, Baker, upon hearing requests for songs from her album, thought, Hey, I must be selling some records. Her statements from Beverly Glen Records said otherwise, insisting she owed them money.
The stand-up-for-yourself Baker decided to take charge. Deciding not to be yet another unnamed African-American artist ripped off by her record label, Baker interviewed managers until she found Sherwin Bash, whom she felt she could trust. Together they sued the company for a proper accounting and her release. Baker eventually won her freedom-and some enmity.
Things got worse when she hired her own accountant, who balked when she insisted he take orders directly from her and not from Bash. "I simply said, You work for me, not Sherwin. I pay you, he doesn't. Therefore, if you dispose of my money without my consent, I will deduct the amount from your bill.'" The accountant promptly complied. She took an equally firm but even more unpopular position with the musicians who played on her dates when she refused to pay them full-time when they arrived late. Many were unhappy with her decision and said so behind her back, helping her budding reputation as a "bitch" grow. But she stuck to her position, insisting, "It's my money and my time. I don't care whether you like it or not."
She was just as directive onstage. When a soundman or stagehand erred, she would chastise him in front of her audience, which caused her bitch reputation to go public. This is the one action she regrets. "It was unprofessional," she says. "l was new to the business then and just didn't know any better. Plus, I was seared, driven by my need to be perfect."
Although she does not discuss the specifics of her contentious tour with Luther Vandross, she openly admits there were problems - "the biggest being that we let others address problems rather than us sitting down and talking them out. Once Luther and I came face-to-face, everything was resolved. It was just one more lesson in how it can all get away from you if you don't take care of things yourself."
Of her reputation for being difficult, Baker says, If you understand a person's origins, you can understand her. I've always had to take care of myself. I couldn't just be that sweet little girl who kept her mouth shut. Had I done that, I'd be long gone by now. In this business, an African-American woman has to protect herself because precious few will. She has to be strong. Look at what happened to those who weren't. I won't put my life in the hands of fate or in the hands of anyone who doesn't know me."
Instead she has put her life in the hands of Walter Bridgforth, a former IBM marketing specialist turned real-estate developer. Working from his office in the couple's French- and English-antique - laden home, Bridgforth has guided Baker's financial holdings to more than $4 million worth of assets. Until Walter, Baker was unaware of how much money she earned. Insisting she learn the business end of music, he made her examine her weekly paycheck and balance it against her weekly overhead.
He also suggested I make changes in how my money was handled," says Baker. At one time, several people had their names on my signature card at the bank and could write checks with my money. No more. At Walter's insistence, only mine now appears. I and I alone have total control."
Today Baker stresses taking control at seminars she gives around the country. "Sisters and brothers must learn to take responsibility for both their money and their lives," she explains. They can't say, Hey, I'm just out there to sing,' because while they're out there singing, someone is always stealing them blind. Walter and I teach these kids to read the fine print on their contracts. I tell them, Take charge. Ignorance is no longer a valid excuse. Empower yourself.'"
This is the same message she imparts parts to the class of 25 she "adopted," when they were enrolled at Berry Elementary School in Detroit. Now high-schoolers, the youngsters are assured scholarships to universities through the Bridgforth Foundation, which Baker established to share the prosperity of her good fortune. "They call themselves the Future Force," she says of her other "children" with un-abashed pride.
When Baker speaks of professional matters - particularly when she discusses career moves, finances and business procedures - her demeanor is that of a strong, successful, takecharge woman. When she speaks of Wzalter, however, she becomes a sweet, shy girl who giggles when she recalls the "silliness" of their meeting.
In the past Anita has maintained she met the Detroit native on a shopping expedition. Today she admits they met when she was performing in a Detroit nightclub. Rapture had just been released, and he stopped her en route to her dressing room, announcing he had just purchased six copies for his sisters and asking if he could have a hug. And she figured, "Hey, that six copies is six more than I've sold all week," and so she hugged him.
The hug, however, did not suffice. "He was so silly. During my show, he held up his credit cards to show he was solvent. Afterward he sent his business card to my dressing room. Mmm, IBM. Not bad, I thought. On the back of the card he wrote: 'Can I take you to lunch? Dinner? Father your child?' He was just s-o-o-o silly," Baker says, looking embarrassed but delighted as she continues to laugh.
His silliness didn't stop her from accepting his lunch and dinner invitations. When she left to perform on the road, she found herself calling him nightly. "He had the most soothing voice. I was very lonely. Hearing his voice would immediately calm me and allow me to sleep. In retrospect, I now think from the moment we met, for all of his antics, I knew he was the one. Walter is a man with strong basic values. He believes in God. He believes in family."
The couple married on Christmas Eve in 1988, and Anita maintains that were it not for Walter, she would not have been able to put her career on hold to have a child. "Prior to Walter, I worked constantly. I was afraid that if I didn't, my success would vanish and me with it. He allowed me to believe I could not only survive but be somebody without performing. His permanency permitted me to sort through my priorities." The first of these was to have a family.
Her first two pregnancies ended in miscarriages. "I sort of came apart. All my old negative feelings reemerged. I felt like such a failure. The first thing I said to Walter was 'I'm sorry.' I cried and cried and then cried some more. I got through because Walter was there for me all the way."
Warned that she could never carry a child to term, Baker endured a surgical procedure to help her sustain a pregnancy. When she eventually conceived, at her doctor's insistence she stayed in bed for most of the nine months. Still the delivery proved near fatal for her and her baby. After ten hours of labor, her uterus ruptured, and little Walter had to be delivered by cesarean.
She cannot express what she felt when the doctors put the baby in her arms. "Completeness? Happiness? These words don't come close to describing my emotions. There truly is nothing I can say to capture what motherhood means to me, particularly given my medical history." She doesn't have to. Her tears and radiant face say it all. Fortunately, she had a much easier time with Edward's birth.
Today Baker feels "an enormous responsibility to ensure that my sons don't make the obituaries at an early age or find themselves behind bars. We don't do drugs, drink or use profanity. Instead we instill morals and values in my boys by raising them with a love of God and a love and respect for themselves and all people. I believe they will have a chance."
She says without equivocation that right now is the happiest time of her life. "My family is my life," she explains. "Although I love my audiences, and their applause has been a balm on what was for many years an open wound, my real confirmation today comes at home. Because home is where I know true peace and love."
"You see," she concludes, her eyes again filled with tears, "Walter loves me. He truly does."