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Mara Levi is more than just another 'lesbian with a guitar'

Musicians have long loved to use those "three small words," but singer-songwriter Mara Levi is upping the ante to five words. And they aren't "no more I-love-yous," at least not literally. When I spoke with Levi by phone from her home in Washington, D.C., she was busy updating her website to get ready for a community building project that asks her fans to describe themselves in five words.

"My CD is called What Are You?" Levi explains. "It's about how we all define ourselves, and should we have to define ourselves the way we're told to. So I'm starting a What Are You? Project. At my live shows I'll take people's pictures, ask them to describe themselves in five words, and put it on my website."

It sounds a little reminscent of participatory art projects like Post Secret, the website that posts anonymous confessions. Levi's familiar with the site, though she confesses one of her inspirations for her project came from a less lofty source.

"There's a place I played in Sheboygan," she recalls, "where you can write stuff on the bathroom wall. That bathroom is covered with people's thoughts and secrets."

There's a lack of pretension in that story that you'll also hear in Levi's music, which is rich and clever - she calls it "smartpop" -while always remaining honest and accessible. Her style is also refreshingly eclectic, both in tone - ranging from the melancholy "Time Goes" to the whimsical "Angelina," a tribute to a certain actress who's "my queen-a" - and influence, drawing on folk, bluegrass, rock and jazz.

"'Angelina', that's one of my favorites," Levi chuckles. "I do it differently every time and make up some new words. It's super fun. And who doesn't love Angelina? Someone should send her the song. Maybe it should be me. But I don't know if she'd be frightened or flattered."

As to her diverse influences, Levi is proud to be tough to pigeonhole. "It goes back to the whole 'what are you thing,'" she reflects. "I don't want people to think: she's a lesbian with a guitar so I know what her songs will be like."

Indeed, Levi is the first lesbian with a guitar I've come across who has beatboxing in her repertoire. When I mention this, she immediately waxes enthusiastic about another new technological project. "I just started using a loop station in my show, so I can use the beatboxing all the way through a song. Some of my songs have six different backing tracks, and I'm trying to work out how to do that live, too. I'm working that out with the loop station."

Levi learned beatboxing at Amherst college, where she was part of an a capella group. The Ohio native arrived in Amherst expecting to graduate with an economics degree, but the pull of music was too strong to resist.

"I chose not to do music because I'd been doing it my whole life and I wanted to try something different. But as much as I liked economics I couldn't stop dong music. So I ended up a musician," Levi finishes, as if loving economics and making a living as a musician are the simplest, and most harmonious, things in the world.

But then, Levi has had an ear for harmony her whole life. Her earliest musical memories are of listening to her parents' folk music tapes on family vacations. "I grew up listening to Arlo Guthrie and Peter, Paul and Mary, that sort of genre," she recalls. "That old school, melodic folk music, and we'd listen to it over and over on long car trips. So that's where I learned to love music and sing along and make harmonies."

The next big influence came in middle school, when Levi, who already played the piano, picked up a new instrument for music class. "I started studying jazz, and Clifford Brown really blew me away. I was a trumpet player so obviously I loved what he was doing. I really didn't learn to love rock 'n' roll until college. Then I started finding the stuff that was moving and intelligent, like Elvis Costello and Aimee Mann.

"I don't think it's unusual for people in this day and age to be exposed to all those different kinds of music," she muses. "What may be unique about me is that I use all those influences in my music. Not all at the same time, of course. One song will be kind of bluegrass, one will be jazzy. It's eclectic but tied together by intelligent lyrics. That's what I'm going for."

The music industry may not be going for artists as mutable as Levi, but she's not going for the music industry either. She laughs at the notion of becoming the next Britney Spears or Justin Timberlake. Noting that new technology has opened new possibilities for musicians, making it easier to self-produce and to connect with music lovers, she says, "It's a nicer game now.

"It's possible to be successful in a different way, that doesn't involve becoming an icon that has nothing to do with who you really are. That's what the indie movement is all about, really. Doing things that are creative and different, and not just bubble gum."

Instead, with innovations like the What Are You? Project, Levi is working on building more authentic relationships with her fans. She's pleased that Boston will be one of the first cities to participate, as she played here much since she left Northampton for D.C.

And speaking of the project: what five words does Levi use to describe herself?

"Oh, I suppose I should be the first one to play the game," she laughs. "Let's see ... ambitious. Queer. Creative. Kind. Driven."

Like Levi's music, that sounds just right.

Mara Levi plays Toad (1920 Mass. Ave., Cambridge) in Massachusetts, along with Liz Stahler and Namoli Brennet, at 7 p.m. on Thursday, May 15. Free admission, 21+. More info at www.maralevi.com.