MUSIC Patti Scialfa finally releases her sophomore album

After years of work, a friend talked her into completing the project.
By LARRY McSHANE
ASSOCIATED PRESS
NEW YORK -- Rising before the sun rose over New Jersey, sitting alone with a barely tuned guitar, Patti Scialfa conjured the songs for her second album while her husband and three kids slept.
"For writing, I get up early in the morning -- 5 o'clock, 4:30," Scialfa said. "I'm a morning person ... So I try to do it while people are asleep. The mornings are the nicest."
But it wasn't until one evening, when Scialfa ran into an old friend, that she was able to turn those songs into a new album, "23rd Street Lullaby." Drummer Steve Jordan, known for his work with Keith Richards and others, met Scialfa at a recent benefit and asked when her next album was due.
More like overdue. Scialfa's solo debut, "Rumble Doll," came out in 1993. But with Jordan's assistance and gentle prodding, album No. 2 was finally completed. It was released this week.
Close connections
"What sparked the whole thing for me was hooking up with Steve Jordan," Scialfa said, sitting in a Manhattan recording studio. "That was really important. He said, 'Let me come down and help you.'"
The pair were once neighbors in Manhattan's Chelsea section, a connection that proved perfect for this project. Scialfa, now 50, had written a series of songs about her life in the neighborhood during the '70s and '80s.
"I realized as I started putting the songs together that a lot of the songs had to do with that time period," the redheaded singer-songwriter related. "I like writing a body of music that has a cohesive, emotional thread through it."
From the title track through album closer "Young in the City," Scialfa provides a tour of the hideaways and hangouts of a transplanted Jersey girl in the Big Apple.
"I had a very naive, romanticized vision of the city," she recounted. "Definitely. But that's what you do when you're young."
Scialfa can provide a good explanation -- several, in fact -- for the delay between albums. There were the three kids; she was pregnant with the second when "Rumble Doll" was released, and the oldest recently turned teenager.
Then there's her husband of 13 years: Yes, that would be Bruce Springsteen. She joined him and the rest of the E Street Band for a pair of world tours in the last five years.
Fitting in her album around birthdays, sick kids and playing sold-out shows from Boston to Barcelona ... well, it got a bit tricky.
"It's a matter of finding the time," Scialfa said with a laugh. "That was not easy."
No battling bands
But songwriting is not a competition in the Springsteen house, and Scialfa bristled slightly when asked if working around the man responsible for "Born to Run" and "Born in the USA" can get intimidating.
"It's a silly question, because you can broaden it," Scialfa said. "So why write music when Bob Dylan has written all the great songs? It doesn't have to be your husband."
With her new album, Scialfa hoped to tour as a solo act for the first time; tentative plans call for a 15- to 20-show itinerary starting in September.