When Gretchen Wing sang in Chicken Biscuit’s debut KLOI benefit concert three years ago, it was only her third time in front of a microphone.
“Once I got to sing backup for this homeless friend of mine at a cafe in North Carolina,” Wing remembers. “And I got to sing ‘The Star-Spangled Banner’ at the high school where I used to teach in Tacoma. Twice. I didn’t know how to hold the mic.”
So is she used to microphones now?
“Getting there.”
In 2012 and 2013, the KLOI Benefit was billed as “Gretchen Wing and Chicken Biscuit.” This year, the Lopez Center marquee says, “Gretchen Wing and Friends, Oct. 26, 4 p.m.” What changed?
The answer is songwriting. “It’s Bill Johnson’s fault,” Wing explains.
Though she had never been a member of any group, Wing always enjoyed singing and playing on her own. After leaving her teaching career to move with husband Ken Wing to Lopez in 2010, she started taking guitar lessons with Bill. He encouraged her to try writing a song as an exercise in music theory.
“I thought, ‘I don’t write songs. Other people write songs,’” Wing remembers.
But she gave it a try, hesitantly playing her first opus for Bill after first making sure he wasn’t looking at her while she sang. When she was done, “Bill said, ‘Hey, that’s a song!’” That was all it took. Two years and 30 songs later, Wing is officially a singer-songwriter.
One might wonder what took songwriting so long to kick in, since Wing’s main occupation since leaving teaching is…writing. Book One of her Young Adult trilogy, “The Flying Burgowski,” debuted last February, and Book Two, “Headwinds,” is scheduled for release Nov. 1.
“People laugh at me, like: ‘Wait a minute, you love to sing and you love to write, and you never thought about putting the two of them together?’” says Wing. “I guess I’m just slow.”
“Slow” does not describe the development of Wing’s musical life since moving to Lopez. “I am so incredibly blessed to play with such talented, generous people,” Wing says. Joining her onstage on Oct. 26 will be many of these Friends: singer-songwriter Lane Langford; vocalists Susie and Nick Teague, Al Lorenzen and Carol Steckler; singer-songwriter Dylan Weber and pianist Kim Smith; pianist-singer Becky Johnson; bass player Bruce Ellestad; mandolin player Lance Brittain; mandolinist-keyboardist Beth Geever; and Ty Pamfiloff, who plays “everything, amazingly.”
Gretchen Wing and Friends will play a mix of traditional and familiar folk and bluegrass, and Wing’s originals…plus a “surprise,” Wing promises. For the audience, the main surprise should be that it took Wing so long to figure out that singing into a microphone is a pretty good idea. Suggested donation at the door is $10.
