Going her own way

Sep. 22—Beth Orton is fumbling with an Instant Pot, but she's a ready and present conversationalist. The inventive singer-songwriter has been touring for two decades since her time with Lillith Fair (the traveling music fair founded in 1997 by, among others, Sarah McLachlan) and her 1999 hit record Central Reservation, but currently, she's experimenting with cooking and eating well on the road.

"It's quite a bit of work," she says as she settles in to eat and chat.

Orton, who performs at the Lensic Performing Arts Center on Sunday, September 24, never intended to become a rock star. She studied acting when she was young, and after losing her parents in her late teens, she spent time in a Thailand monastery before embarking on her musical career. Her sound is sometimes acoustic and sometimes tinged with electronics, and now, as she tours behind her seventh record, the self-produced 2022 release Weather Alive, she reflects on her enigmatic path in art.

Q: Have you always been involved in production work in your career, or was that a new development for the Weather Alive album?

I've always been involved in choosing my bands, but I've never produced a record in the same way that I did this record. It just happened pretty naturally.

Q: Is it fair to say that you came to music a little bit late in life? You were 29 when your second album, Central Reservation, was released.

It's complex. I didn't believe it was my place in life. It wasn't something I thought was going to be my destiny. And then it ended up being this way. It's just an amazing gift.

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Beth Orton and her band plays at 7:30 p.m. on Sunday, September 24, at the Lensic Performing Arts Center, 211 San Francisco Street. Tickets are $34 to $54. Visit lensic.org or bethortonofficial.com.

Q: When you made your first album, Trailer Park, in 1996, you didn't have a lot of training on your instruments. Did you know the guitar or the piano really well at that point?

No, but I always knew how to write a song. Music was just in my house, and it was in my psyche. I didn't even realize how connected I was to the music around me. It's funny. My husband plays a lot of jazz, and he'll be playing something and I'll just start singing along. And he'll say, "How do you know what song that is?" Melodies go in my head, and I remember them. I remember words, and it's just always been something in my life that's been there.

Q: I read that you were taking guitar lessons from [the late U.K. innovative folk guitar player] Bert Jansch midway through your career. Is that true? It's interesting that you still wanted to grow as an artist.

Definitely. Who wouldn't want to grow? I can't imagine not wanting to learn stuff. But it's a funny thing, because it's very instinctual as well. I just had a few piano lessons, and I was like, "Oh no, I don't want to know what I'm doing," because it kind of undermines your confidence in a funny way to know not enough or just enough. I think I'm better off with instinct in a way.

Q: What's your songwriting process? Do you use the guitar or piano? Does the music come before the words?

I use both. I'll be playing whatever instrument, and what definitely comes first is I'll find a kind of pattern I'll like. Often a melody will just come with that. And there will be words, but they may not make sense. Gradually, I realize that a whole meaning is there. It's clearly very subconscious, but I try to listen to not only the melody but those first words that, at first glance, don't seem to make complete sense. You go back and realize, "I'm telling a story. I just didn't know what it was." And later I might more consciously sew in other ideas to that.

Q: Do you develop a huge backlog of material between albums? Is that why it sometimes takes four years or six years between releases?

I'm very picky. I keep a lot back. And I've lived quite a lot of life, I think. I've had children; my daughter is now 16 and my son is 12. That will take up your time. So I've had a few years off, basically. I always thought music would be a phase, and then it became my life.

Q: When you went to Thailand as a youngster, was it hard for you at that point to imagine how your life would turn out?

That was an interesting time, for sure. The monastery was life-changing and very grounding. In a way, I sometimes feel that I left there, and I started to write music. And I do wonder, in a way, if that's how I kept the meditation is through music. For me, it's a form of meditation; I don't consciously sit down and say, "Ok, meditate," but it's just a nice state of mind.

Q: When Central Reservation comes out, does that open a lot of doors? Does it make you start to think, "This is where I'm supposed to be?"

I never really thought it was where I was supposed to be. I've always thought I'm supposed to be somewhere else, like this is something that happened to me. ... But once I found music and writing songs, it took over. That just changed the course of things.

Q: Do you have musical role models who inspire you?

Oh yes. Joni Mitchell, obviously. Leonard Cohen. And Neil Young. All the Canadians. I think Lucinda Williams is a beautiful, beautiful songwriter. A really incredible songwriter. I look up to her. I look up to classic songwriters.

Q: What was the pandemic like for you? Was it as hard for artists as it was for everyone else?

I think so. I don't know anyone who got out of it unscathed. But creatively, it ended up being a really productive time. It's odd, isn't it? It was not an easy time for many people. But there were odd things that came out of it that were wonderful, like this record.

Q: Do you think the isolation allowed you to be in a more creative space?

I felt like I was in time with the world. There were a lot of things coming up that I relate to and had felt for a long time. For me, and I don't mean this in any weird way, it was just extreme relief that the world was falling into step with itself. But it was hard work. And it still is; we can't pretend that it's passed. Everybody's like, "Well, that happened." But what else can we do? We have to move on. I do think sometimes we need to acknowledge it again.