Recent events shape singer's new CD.

Byline: Paul Denison The Register-Guard

In one sense, "The Red Thread" is Lucy Kaplansky's Sept. 11 album.

On Sept. 11, 2001, Kaplansky and her husband, Rick Litvin, watched from their New York City apartment as the World Trade Center burned and collapsed just a mile away.

A "natural result" of being that close on that day, she said in a recent record-label press release, "was to focus on the things that are most important in one's life. At the top of that list was family. And specifically, for my husband and me, starting a family."

Kaplanksy and Litvin did that in November, when they completed an 18-month adoption process and brought home their daughter, Molly Fuxiang, a Chinese orphan. And the songs they wrote together for "The Red Thread" touchingly reflect both life-changing experiences: Sept. 11 and imminent parenthood.

In his review in Performing Songwriter magazine, Bob Cannon calls `Thread' Kaplanksy's "most focused and emotionally charged" album to date.

On the first track, "I Had Something," Kaplansky sings, "I had something made me walk all night/ Made me run from home, made me fight/ I had something made me feel alone/ Like an orphan waiting for a home."

On the fourth song, "This Is Home," she sings, "When I found you I knew that you'd be mine/ It wasn't my first kiss, it wasn't my first time/ It was the first time I gave my heart when it wasn't just a loan/ I put it in your hands and I followed you home."

Both songs circle around to embrace their child: "Not yet born, not yet known/ Another orphan waiting for a home," and, "When we find her we'll belong to her/ We won't see her first smile, we won't hear her first word/ But ours will be the hearts she holds in her hands/ She can keep them beside her in her very own room."

A third song, "The Red Thread," then ties her feelings about her own mother to her anticipation of motherhood: "And when I wrap her up warm, you'll be right next to me/ 'Cause they say the red thread that ties me to you ties her to me."

The album's title refers to an ancient Chinese belief that when a child is born, invisible red threads tie its spirit to everyone who will be an important part of its life.

Sept. 11 left a significant mark

The album's Sept. 11 thread runs through three other Kaplansky-Litvin songs.

In the hard-rocking "Line in the Sand," Kaplansky decries the violence between Israelis and Palestinians: "And dreams are lost one at a time, blown across both sides of the line/ ... And there's so much blood on all our hands, it cuts an even deeper line in the sand."

"Land of the Living" was inspired by three compelling Sept. 11 images: Muslim taxi drivers kneeling on their prayer rugs at LaGuardia Airport, a Middle Eastern cab driver who had been beaten up, and the flowers and cards that people left around the base of a scale-model Statue of Liberty at the New York-New York Hotel and Casino in Las Vegas.

"There's shadows of the lost on the faces I see," she sings, "brothers and strangers on this island of grief/ There's death in the air, but there's life on this street, there's life on this street."

"Brooklyn Train," the third song in this group, and the last on the album, ties everything together:

"And in all these faces it's myself I see, and the threads that connect these faces to me/ ... Nobody speaks, everyone stares, remembering all that used to be there/ And only the living know what loss means/ We're riding together on this morning train."

Some help from her friends

Slipped in between the Kaplansky-Litvin songs and their themes are covers of songs by Bill Morrissey (`Love Song/New York'), James McMurtry (`Off and Running'), Buddy Miller and Jim Lauderdale (`Hole in My Head') and the late Dave Carter (`Cowboy Singer'). All four have to do with love on the run - wistful, feisty, reckless, sad - and all four demonstrate Kaplansky's skill at finding good songs.

Which is how she started out in New York City, singing harmony vocals with many other performing songwriters, including Shawn Colvin. Kaplansky kept it up even after she dropped out of the music scene to earn a doctorate in psychology and to work as a clinical psychologist.

Kaplansky harmonized on Colvin's Grammy-winning album "Steady On," on Nanci Griffith's "Lone Star State of Mind" and "Little Love Affairs," and on four John Gorka albums.

Eventually, Colvin got Kaplansky into a studio and produced some solo tapes that led to a contract with Red House Records. Kaplansky has made five albums on that label: "The Tide" (1994), "Flesh and Bone" (1996), "Ten Year Night" (1999), "Every Single Day" (2001) and "The Red Thread," which was released last month.

A mix of rock, folk, country and pop, the new album includes harmony vocals by Jonatha Brooke, Richard Shindell, Eliza Gilkyson and Gorka.

Beautifully produced by Ben Wittman - with Wittman on drums, Duke Levine and Jon Herington on guitars and Zev Katz on bass, among others - "The Red Thread" perfectly supports Kaplansky's straightforward, unforced but remarkably expressive singing.

Ten of Kaplansky's concerts this year will be benefits for Half the Sky, a nonprofit organization created by adoptive parents of orphaned Chinese children. Half the Sky operates 13 centers in China to provide nurturing and educational experiences for babies and children waiting to be adopted.

Although Kaplanksy reportedly has a late-bloomer's dedication to her music career, she's even more dedicated to being a good mother. She now performs only on weekends, and her familytravels with her.

Paul Denison can be reached at 338-2323 or pdenison@ guardnet.com.

CONCERT PREVIEW

Lucy Kaplansky,

with Laura Kemp

When: 8 p.m. Saturday

Where: Cafe Paradiso, 115 W. Broadway

How much: $16.50 through Cafe Paradiso, 484-9933

CAPTION(S):

Lucy Kaplansky will sing about the ties that bind when she plays at Cafe P on Saturday.