Judy Collins has been a leading light in the music industry for over half a century. Now, at age 85, she’s getting set to perform live in Ventura County on Sunday.
"I'm 85 now, and I always like to say that's the new 27, so I'm happy to be what I am," the singer told KCLU ahead of her show.
She said she doesn't just have as much enthusiasm as ever for performing live, but "more, more!"
Her cut crystal vocals and heartfelt lyrics have earned her a place in our hearts and in history. Her 1970 a cappella recording of Amazing Grace was entered in the Library of Congress National Recording Registry.
"It is a particular honor," Collins told KCLU. "First of all, we tried it with instruments and I said, 'It just sounds awful.' So then we went to a church up on the Columbia University campus, the one that is being sued now by the Trump organization, and I sang a cappella with a few other voices. It suddenly, overnight, became a major hit, and my record company was so surprised."
Collins showcased a firm commitment to social activism from her early days in the 1960s, and reflects on the healing power of music.
She said, "I do start off most of my concerts with singing, and I'll sing something that they know, and everybody will sing. That's so exciting to get that off the ground because then you're a unified group. And also, I had a tragedy recently that my husband died, my husband of 46 years. And I say to my audience, 'tonight you're my grief group'. You know, everybody has something. And so we all bond together. It's very healing for me to do what I do."
The singer has come back from her share of setbacks. She was hospitalized with polio at age 11.
"I had polio then and then I had TB," she said. "Then I had alcoholism, which I got over by going to treatment 46 years ago. I've been sober ever since, which is a miracle, and I don't know how I could have handled anything because I was dying of this illness.
"I do a lot of exercise, a lot of maintenance of my health with food, with supplements, with one thing and another. I'm always working on that to keep steady so that I can go forward and keep doing these shows and helping people because it is a help."
"Music helps people to get through the hard times and the good times," she said.
Judy Collins plays the Performing Arts Center in Thousand Oaks Sunday at 6.30 p.m.
