It's a busy time for singer Kate McGarry, with European and U.S. tours, CD release festivities, imminent professoring at the New York Manhattan School of Music, and recording with the new vocal group, Moss. Her newest CD, The Target (Palmetto, 2007), hit Jazz Week at #37 and rose to #18 barely two weeks later; it's also climbing fast on the college charts, reflecting the broad appeal of McGarry's beautiful voice and rangy material. Married since 2004 to guitarist and band mate Keith Ganz, McGarry brings something new and refreshing to the music scene: true talent without pretension. As pianist/composer Fred Hersch puts it, "Kate McGarry is a singer of great warmth and emotional connection who is blessed with a magical voice and a curious musical mind. She really has it all".

All About Jazz: Tell me about your Russian tortoise.

Kate McGarry: That's Turbo, aka Buddy, also Tur. When I get mad at him I call him Turbo F. Ganz: "Turbo F. Ganz, you get back here right this moment!

AAJ: You can talk to a turtle?

KM: No. Not really. Keith thinks he interacts more. The thing about Turbo is that he directly reflects what's going on with Keith. It happens all the time. One day the turtle would be like hiding under a thing, and the whole day Keith is like hiding under a thing. It's really wild. Another time, Turbo's up and running around, and Keith is up and running around.

AAJ: Who starts it?

KM: The turtle seems to reflect Keith.

AAJ: I'm relieved to hear that.

KM: But I look to the turtle for signs of what's going on with him. Turbo doesn't make any noise, which is a good kind of pet, but he's not cozy.

AAJ: You can't really cuddle a turtle.

KM: No. And our bacteria's not good for him. You can't touch him, and their bacteria is bad for us, so you have to be careful.

AAJ: It's not your usual pet. So what inspired you to buy a Christmas turtle for Keith?

KM: 'Cause he always talked about them. He relates to turtles; he has a deep love for things that move slowly and at their own pace.

AAJ: I wanted to get into that paradox thing we talked about earlier, because the more I listen to you, the more I'm struck by it. When you first hear your voice, it's sweet and girlish and pure, with that little rasp in it that makes it so wistful. But then you notice how sophisticated your singing is, and your placement, and your ideas, and it's "Wait a minute: what am I listening to?" It's innocence, but it's sophistication; it's free with a definite shape. So talk to me about paradox.

KM: For me it's always been true that when I have an experience of something that felt absolutely like core—really true—it would almost always come in conjunction with something that was the opposite, a situation you'd think was ugh, the worst of the worst of the worst. But right at the pinnacle of that, the cap's off the head and it's all open and wow and OK. The apparent paradox is when you get a little bit above, where you get a bigger view, you see they're not really in opposition.

AAJ: They're a necessary part of each other.

KM: Yeah, there's something about the tension between the two. In music, my interests are both in purity of sound, or less is more, plus the intricacy of sound—like, what was that horn player doing there, what was that line, how did he massage that change? I think it comes from the wish to express something really fully, and yet really simply too.

AAJ: And now, a couple of history questions. You grew up in Hyannis, Massachusetts as number six of ten kids. How did that influence your path?

KM: I think my growing-up circumstances had a big impact on my music because there were so many of us, and it was a very chaotic and crisis-driven household. Mom was very ill most of the time since I was little, and so to some extent she was just out of the picture, except that she needed a lot of caretaking.

AAJ: What did she have?

KM: She had Addison's disease: all the adrenals, all the glands, everything shut down, so she lived on cortisone her whole life. And was severely depressed—not able to get up. But one thing we always did was make music together, the whole family. That was one place where we could be together. My mother and father, both, have the most beautiful voices. And for them, singing was the people's entertainment.

AAJ: So music was a way of taking care of each other?

KM: Yes. Also, they were very religious, so we would sing the Rosary together, especially when things weren't great—that was the thing that would pull it all together.

I have an early experience of the power of singing. When Tricia, my second-to-the-youngest sister, was really little, she had a terrible fever that wouldn't go away. She was up at 105, and it went on for days and days. We were worried about brain damage. The priest came, and we gave her cold baths, but the fever just wouldn't go down. At one point my Mom brought us all up to her room. She put Tricia on her bed on a blanket, and we all held hands around the bed, and we said the Rosary.