138

Tête-à-tête with Gloria Loring.                                        Maximillien de Lafayette interviews Gloria Loring

MH: If you had to summarize your whole life in one single song title, what it would be?
Gloria: Amazing Grace
MH: What "New Visions or new feelings" did you bring to the world of music?
Gloria: New? I don't think I ever had a vision. I just wanted to sing and be heard. So there's nothing new in what I do. I've just been trying all these years to become the best and fullest expression of this "Gloria." If anything, I've accepted that we are all linked by our best and worst intentions, emotions and motivations. I feel all the things everyone does, and that's what I have come to look for in my musical expressions - our commonality.
MH: What is a "Femme Fatale" to you?
Gloria: A woman like Greta Garbo, who makes women take notice and men ache.
MH: Are you one?
Gloria: Oh, no. Maybe for a few minutes, (I've been told) in my earlier years, but I don't think I ever had the attitude to really achieve that rank.
MH: You have multidimensional talents in so many areas. It is overwhelming and..... of course, you have created so many different stage personalities. Would this "varied persona of an artist" deprives you from defining the Loring Genre?
Gloria: Perhaps the only place I've created variety was in playing characters as an actress. My persona has been redefined, as is everyone's, as I have cast aside habits and beliefs I no longer needed and accepted what I now see as true. The variety has been provided by Providence. Opportunities were put in my path and I took them...
MH: Then what is the "Loring Style"?
Gloria: First of all, Loring is a taken name. I was born Gloria Jean Goff. My style, hmmmm, I would think mostly open and heart-connected, on my good days.   I hope I've learned to be somewhat graceful in most situations. Not too fussy with clothes. With music, arranging the words and music to provide the maximum emotional impact as I see it. With friends and family (and the public), trying to give what I'd like to get.
MH: What was or is or are the song (s) others sang you wished were yours?
Gloria:  Wing Beneath my Wings, Love Lift Us Up Where We Belong.
MH: What was the best gift you have ever received?
Gloria: My sons.
MH: And the one you have ever given?
Gloria: The continual softening of my outer crust.
MH: What people notice first about you?
Gloria: I've been told two things: my smile and my eyes.
MH: And what you notice first about people?
Gloria: The eyes. Their clarity and whether there is sadness or anger there.
MH: What do you fear most in life?
Gloria: Failing to have lived up to my potential. Getting to those last moments and feeling I was mistaken about the real meaning of my life.
MH: Do you talk about it in your music and lyrics?
Gloria: I have occasionally. I think the songs on the CD Turn the Page best speak of my perspective.
MH: The two most beautiful lines of a song you sang or heard?
Gloria: I can't think at the moment, but I'm sure it would be something from a Leonard Cohen song.

Continues on the following pages.