Becca Mancari has one of the gentlest singing voices of any Nashville musician, and most of her songs could work as a lullaby. But Mancari is living proof that you don’t have to be able to rattle the rafters to carry extraordinary power in your music.
Her second LP The Greatest Part, released in June, traces the contours of the impacts that painful experiences have left on her life, centered around her coming out as queer to her evangelical Christian family. But the songs — rendered in an effortlessly fluid style that draws on ’70s rock, pop and a bit of disco with help from producer and co-writer Zac Farro — communicate tremendous strength and address different ways to heal, or at least to make progress. In the standout “First Time,” Mancari revisits the line “I remember the first time my dad didn’t hug me back” several times. Over the course of the song, she turns it from an expression of devastating grief to one of empowered resolve. In light of the work that Mancari and her family have done to rebuild their relationship, she was reluctant at first to be as open as she is in her songs, but she knew what good they could do.
“I felt like it was important for people who I know have similar experiences,” Mancari said. “And even for parents to listen to these songs — ‘First Time’ in particular — and to think, ‘I have the choice to hug my child back.’ ” STEPHEN TRAGESER
