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The BiTS Interview: Geoff Muldaur

Geoff Muldaur (born August 12, 1943) is an American active singer, guitarist and

composer, who was a founding member of the Jim Kweskin Jug Band and a member of
Paul Butterfield's “Better Days”. He also recorded with Bobby Charles, Jerry Garcia, Eric

Von Schmidt, Bonnie Raitt, and John Cale. In the early 1980s, Muldaur left the stage and
recording studio for a working sabbatical. He wrote scores for film and television, won

an Emmy Award, and produced albums for Lenny Pickett and Richard Greene.

BiTS: Okay then. Let’s make a start. I want to talk to you, of course, about this absolutely fabulous
new set of pieces of music by you under the title of “His Last Letter”. Tell me how the idea came
to you in the first place. I know
that you found a letter and
various other bits. What gave
you the idea of doing an
international piece of work?

GM: My goodness. Well, there’s a
lot to that question. I mean, in
terms of just starting to do some
music in Amsterdam and see
what came of it, that was just, I
don’t know, it was an idea that
dropped out of the clouds, but in
terms of getting the last letter
from my great grandfather and
writing an octet, that came about
halfway through the process of
Geoff Muldaur
being in Amsterdam, and it was
moving. It was quite moving, and
I had some pieces of music that I had slated to sometime and someday be used in a classical piece
and I just started doing it, man. When you start a book or a piece of music or whatever, after a
while, it starts to write you, you know.

BiTS: [Chuckling] Yes, I understand.

GM: Yes, just getting started is the key, so that’s what I did and out came a 20-minute octet and
I’m very happy with it and I’m very, very pleased to have spent that time in Amsterdam and met
all these great musicians. What a joy.

BiTS: The CDs are absolutely fabulous and the book is unspeakably beautiful. I just love it. I love

it all. Tell me, you’ve got two CDs, each with about ten or 11 tracks on them. How much stuff did
you throw away?
GM: I can think of three pieces, you can’t say throw away, but we didn’t publish them with

everything else. They didn’t hold up, or they were too different or whatever, but I hope you’re
happy with what’s there. This is very common when you make an album, there’s cuts that don’t
make it on the album. That’s all.