Alison Stewart: This is All Of It on WNYC, I'm Alison Stewart. We continue this hour of concert previews with a benefit called Mama Was a Rolling Stone: A Night with Domino Kirke and Fellow Mama Musicians. That's right. An all mom concert organized by singer, songwriter, and trained doula Domino Kirke. [MUSIC - Domino Kirke: It's Not There]

Alison Stewart: The show happens on December 17th at National Sawdust, and Kirke will host a lineup that includes Rachael Price of Lake Street Dive, Joan As Police Woman, and other performers who are musicians and they happen to be moms. The show will benefit Kirke's organization, Carriage House Birth, which provides doula services and training and childbirth education for families. Domino, welcome to All Of It.

Domino Kirke: Hey, thanks so much for having me, Alison.

Alison Stewart: You founded Carriage House Birth in 2012. What was the original goal of the collective?

Domino Kirke: The goal of the collective was to create community around pregnant families and pregnant people. I think it was just at a time when people were starting to second guess giving birth in the city and how to create their teams. They didn't want to only deliver in hospitals. They wanted to give birth sort of back to the people. Doulas had been around since the '70s, but sort of went away. Of course, it's an ancient art, being bedside with someone giving birth. I feel like the collective was created to sort of recreate the village, or community around such an intense initiation.

Alison Stewart: What inspired you to train to be a doula?

Domino Kirke: I had a birth that went not as planned. [chuckles]

Alison Stewart: Okay.

Domino Kirke: As many of them do. I really just felt this lack of care, this gap in my care. There were a couple of doulas that I had met through being pregnant. I was 25 when I was pregnant, so I didn't have a ton of parents around me. I was a musician and I was working just odd jobs, really, as a musician. So I just didn't have a lot of people around me that were knowledgeable about birth and the birthing process. So I just sought out the care of someone who was more knowledgeable than me, that was non-medical. I found out that that was a doula.

When I got my own doula, or met a handful of them, I decided that-- I didn't know it at the time, but I was suddenly really interested in that as a job, but I had to give birth first. So I gave birth and I was like, "Wow. Like, I can't do this." In my mind, many people can be doulas. It's all about energy and space holding. Right? You don't have to have given birth to be good at it, per se, but I felt like, for me, I had to give birth to really feel ready to hold that space and to be in that role. Once I gave birth and it went the way it did, I went, "Wow." I really needed many doulas holding me, because people just don't give birth in community anymore.

Everyone is so-- there's so much individualism, and everyone's so siloed. Especially in New York City, where very few people are actually from. They don't have their families around them. So I just was like, "Wow, I want to be that person for a family or a person giving birth," because I feel that is the missing link, because we just-- we don't live in intergenerational homes anymore. Everyone's just doing what they need to do for themselves and a partner. Right? I just was like, "I have to just train, and who knows where it will lead me." Then I met a couple of other doulas and we formed a collective.

Alison Stewart: How has being a doula changed your perspective on parenting, even with your older kids?

Domino Kirke: Being on any profession that has you on call, I think is, it keeps you in the moment. It keep-- there's a presence. You have to be fully in the moment or you're going to miss it, because you literally can be called at any minute to go and be there for someone giving birth, and you could be gone for days. I think as a younger mom, I may have lost myself in the role a little bit, because it was a way to make money, but also to be of service. I think my son, you know, I was a single mom for a handful of years in the beginning, and, yes, that was-- it was challenging to be on call, but it was also exhilarating.

I think that was something that I've now, 17 nearly, years later, I feel that, yes, it just-- it kept me really present with my son, because I just never knew when I was going to leave him.

Alison Stewart: Your new album is The Most Familiar Star, and you tackle something that a lot of mothers tackled. I tackled it. Trying to figure out who you are after motherhood and who you will be.

Domino Kirke: Yes.

Alison Stewart: How did making the album lead you to a new light? To a new way of thinking?

Domino Kirke: I mean, the album for me was like-- it was like a medley of-- I'd made a record before that and several EPs, and I touched it on those records, but with this one, it was kind of like a huge sort of sweeping reflection of my time as a mom. I recently went from two children to four children. I just gave birth to twins about, gosh, three months ago now. [laughs]

Alison Stewart: Oh, goodness gracious.

Domino Kirke: So, I'm deeply, yes, deeply postpartum, but also, I mean, postpartum is forever, which is kind of like a thing we say in the birth community. The music really is just a moment to reflect on the grief that comes with becoming a parent, the loss of spontaneity and who you were prior, and just also giving yourself enough grace to get to know who you are and understand that you won't be that person right away. You won't love your child the way you imagined right away. You won't know how to do the thing right away.

So I think the record is about, it's really me saying goodbye to an old life, while being uncertain about who I am in the role still, because my kids are still quite young. I mean, they're 16 and younger. So, I do feel like I've learned a lot, but I have a lot of older mothers around me and I feel like it's still-- I still got a lot more to learn. [laughs]

Alison Stewart: I'm speaking to musician Domino Kirke about her upcoming benefit concert, Mama Was a Rolling Stone: A Night with Domino Kirke and Fellow Mama Musicians. The concert proceeds will go towards birthing education and doula training through Kirke's organization, Carriage House Birth. The concert is December 17th at National Sawdust. The name of your album is The Most Familiar Star. What is the most familiar star?

Domino Kirke: Myself. [laughs] Coming back to your source material, really. I think that's-- my producer, the record was produced by Chris Taylor of the band Grizzly Bear. We were chatting a lot about the title. He said, "This record reminds me so much of like a-- there's like a coming of age story sort of woven into the lyrics, and this to me is about you, like on every level." There is a lyric in the song The Most Familiar Star, which didn't always used to be called that. Then we decided to change the name of the song and give the whole record the title. So, yes, it's really about coming back to self.

Alison Stewart: Let's take a listen to Most Familiar Star.

[MUSIC - Domino Kirke: The Most Familiar Star]

Alison Stewart: That's Domino Kirke. This benefit concert, let's talk about it. It's going to be at National Sawdust on December 17th. The lineup is full of moms.

Domino Kirke: Yes. [laughs]

Alison Stewart: Who's involved? How did it come together?

Domino Kirke: Oh, it's funny. I mean, I'm on a WhatsApp thread with a lot of touring musicians who also happen to be mothers. The name of the WhatsApp is called Mama Was a Rolling Stone. I always sort of fantasized about making music with half-- like, all of the women on the thread, but I just thought, "God, can a handful of us get together and just perform?" This was sort of last minute, by the way. Eva Tolkin is not on the thread, [chuckles] but she will be soon. Joan As Police Woman is the godmother of my children, and she's a dear friend.

So, she was like, "No problem. Absolutely. I'll be there." Then Rachael Price, I was actually her doula, which was really amazing to experience that, to be connected to her socially, and then be a fan of Lake Street Dive, and her voice.

Alison Stewart: Oh, she's so great. Her voice is so beautiful.

Domino Kirke: So her, yes, giving birth, I'm like, "Oh my God, I just want-- I selfishly just want all these women in one place just for me, so I can hang out them." It's also my birthday that day, so I was like, "What do I want for my birthday? I would like to hang out with mothers who make music, who I respect, who I may have given-- who I may have watched give birth," which is just like an added side. [laughs]

Yes, it's Odetta Hartman, Sima Cunningham, all of them are just so fantastic, and I thought we just all need to be-- I mean, this needs to be a festival. There will be another version of this show. Then, yes, we have a scholarship fund at Carriage House Birth at my doula collective, where the money goes towards families that can't afford childbirth education or newborn care education, and also doulas that want to get trained but don't have the funds and serving more underserved areas. The scholarship fund is pretty amazing. It does reach all the best people. Yes, it's just a night to combine all my loves and all the things I do.

Alison Stewart: The concert is December 17th at National Sawdust. It's called Mama Was a Rolling Stone: A Night with Domino Kirke and Fellow Mama Musicians. We hope you have a great concert, Domino.

Domino Kirke: Thank you.

Alison Stewart: Let's go out. Another song from Domino Kirke. Here's City.