Pink Martini mixes it up with Charlotte Symphony

When musicians like Mary Chapin Carpenter, Indigo Girls or the Pointer Sisters team up with a local orchestra like the Charlotte Symphony, the combination is usually something new for the artists and their audience.

But for Portland’s multi-lingual, genre-blending Pink Martini – which plays Charlotte Symphony’s pop series Friday and Saturday – orchestral shows are just another gig.

“A big portion of our year is booked with orchestras,” says vocalist and songwriter China Forbes, who helped Harvard classmate Thomas Lauderdale launch the eclectic ensemble in 1995. They began doing symphony shows in 1998.

“The regular show is looser. We’re not jamming or improvising all the time, but we can fill with a song if we feel like it. With an orchestra, everything is very planned. It’s more serious and regimented. But you have this beautiful sound of an orchestra behind you. It’s kind of a thrill to stand on stage and hear the music to its fullest potential.”

Shifting from jazz to classical to standards to pop in a myriad of languages, Pink Martini is unique in its global appeal. Its five albums have gone gold in Greece, Turkey, France, and Canada. Its first hit was in French, and it translates songs like “Armado Mio” into different languages according to its audience.

“I just did it in Vietnamese,” says Forbes, who started out singing opera accompanied by Lauderdale in college, before trying her hand as an actress and singer-songwriter in New York.

“Thomas and I are both from multicultural families. He’s one of four adopted children, all from different backgrounds. My sister and I are biracial,” says Forbes, whose childhood is the subject of the new Mark Ruffalo film “Infinitely Polar Bear” (which her sister Maya wrote).

“I grew up with a white dad from a French, English and Scottish background. My mom is African-American. Thomas is Asian and studied Japanese. My dad spoke French. I studied Italian when I was thinking of singing opera. That was just our background.”

“It became expected,” she says of hopping from foreign film themes to Japanese, Greek, Spanish and French early on. “Thomas always said he didn’t like the sound of English. He felt like songs sounded better in other languages.”

Another unique aspect of Pink Martini is that, since 2010, Forbes has alternated tours with co-vocalist Storm Large – which allows her to spend time at home with her 6-year-old son and work on her solo career.

“That happened when I lost my voice,” she says. “The band was booked with the National Symphony for four sold-out concerts, and I had to drop out.” She ended up taking a six-month break, which led to going part-time permanently.

“I think I’ve missed North Carolina lately,” she says.

For Pink Martini, more is merrier – whether that means working with the Von Trapps on their most recent album, adding a vocalist, or working with everyone from Rufus and Martha Wainwright to Carol Channing and Mamie Van Doren.

“Thomas wants more people and more instruments and more cupcakes,” Forbes says, with a laugh, before summing up Pink Martini. “It’s not the most economical, sensible choice. He’s not interested in that. He’s interested in the fairy dust and beautiful music and fun and personalities.”

This story was originally published April 30, 2015 at 4:32 PM with the headline "Pink Martini mixes it up with Charlotte Symphony."