WALTER SCOTT
Bonnie Raitt at Tanglewood, 1991.
Anastasia: What can we expect when you return to Tanglewood on August 31 with Jimmie Vaughan & The Tilt-A-Whirl Band?
Bonnie: Jimmie and I have known each other and played together when he was in The Fabulous Thunderbirds, and I was friends with his brother, Stevie Ray. We all were part of the Austin blues scene when
I ' d come through town, and we did a lot of touring together in the’ 70s especially. So it ' ll be a great reunion. The last time I played at Tanglewood was literally the biggest audience I ' d played to in many, many years. It was almost 17,000 people. My recollection not only was it a great show for the audience and us, but it was freezing. It was 55 degrees. So, I’ m hoping it’ ll be warmer. It ' ll be a great celebration. What you can expect is me going back to some deep cuts from albums that not everybody has. I ' m at the point where I’ m pretty good at picking songs that work live and jettisoning the ones that don ' t feel right for this era. We ' ll play the ones they expect.
Anastasia: Do you ever get tired of performing“ I Can ' t Make You Love Me,” or any of those other popular hits?
Bonnie: I don’ t. It ' s different every night. I grew up with my dad, John Raitt, basically rotating summer stock, every summer. He played in the show Carousel, where he was the original leading man, and Oklahoma, and also he was the originator of Sid
Sorokin in Pajama Game. He later went on to do Music Man and On a Clear Day and Shenandoah and Zorba and a lot of different other shows, but he made every night opening night. And I mean that sincerely. I watched him imbue those songs and the production as if he ' d never played them before. Every night now, I get really deep inside, especially the ballads, because if I ever start phoning it in, I ' ll hang up my spurs. Every night is a different opening night. Some of those people are seeing me for the first time, and some of them have seen you many times, and you want to show that you still have the emotional connection with them for those songs that mean as much to me as they do to them.
Anastasia: What was it like growing up in a household of music?
Bonnie: I grew up in a combination of Westchester, New York, where my dad was on Broadway and in Pajama Game, and then when he was in the movie with Doris Day, we moved back out to California in’ 57, and I stayed there from seven
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32 // BERKSHIRE MAGAZINE May / June 2025