This article appeared in the Dec. 2, 2011 Jewish Advocate.

By Susie Davidson

Advocate Correspondent　

Rocker turns her focus to survivors of trauma

Photo caption: Robin Lane came of age in ‘60s California. Her father, Ken Lane, co-wrote the Dean Martin hit “Everybody Loves Somebody Sometime.”

Robin Lane, who describes her life as a “tragicomedy,” recalls rolling on the floor in laughter as she and an interviewer marveled at her powers of survival.

Coming of age in ’60s California, Lane cavorted with members of Buffalo Springfield, the Byrds, Arthur Lee and Love, and other musical icons of the era. The daughter of Dean Martin’s musical arranger and pianist, Ken Lane, she grew up amid Hollywood glamour.

Lane cut a defining course in the punk music scene with her seminal band, The Chartbusters, who were named amongRolling Stone’s　Top 10 Bands of 1980. She lived with and sang for Neil Young (for example, on “Round and Round” and on the album “Everybody Knows This is Nowhere”), and was married to Police guitarist Andy Summers.

But her life was nothing to be envied. She also endured neglect as a child, domestic violence as an adult and the rollercoaster ride of stardom.

Lane is now putting her talents to work to help fellow survivors of trauma through her nonprofit Songbird Sings, for which she will perform a benefit Dec. 3 in Burlington. The organization, based in Franklin County in Western Massachusetts, helps victims of domestic violence, childhood abuse and other traumatic situations.

In an interview with　The Advocate,　Lane talked about how her family was swept in trauma on a much larger scale.

“My father’s side was Jewish,” she said by phone from her home in Western Massachusetts. “His grandparents came from Poland and Latvia, and though they arrived at Ellis Island around the turn of the century, they would return every year to Europe to see their families.” Their last trip overseas was 1938; most of their relatives would perish in the concentration camps.

The family name, Lifschitz, was changed to Lane when her father was 5.

Her mother “was a beautiful model who had difficulties being a mother,” Lane said. Her father – whom she describes as a “romantic character who married several times” – was an arranger and songwriter. He co-wrote the song “Everybody Loves Somebody Sometime,” which was recorded by Frank Sinatra, Dinah Washington and Peggy Lee before Martin turned it into a No. 1 hit.

A musical prodigy, Lane began his career in Tin Pan Alley and moved the family from Brooklyn to Los Angeles when he landed a job as a musical arranger with Paramount Pictures. Although he would take his daughter and her brother to occasional dinners and excursions, she spoke of a childhood defined by absence and rejection.

“My grandparents were the stabilizing force in my early life, and we’d always enjoy lox, bagels, and chopped liver,” she said of her father’s parents. Lane said she has passed along those food traditions to her daughter, Evangeline, a 29-year-old Somerville photographer who went on a Birthright trip in 2007.

“I don’t believe my mother ever asked me one question about school, me, my day or anything like that,” Lane said. “Nor did she ever say, ‘I love you.’”

She added that her experience probably was not uncommon for children in Hollywood, with its self-absorbed stars.

“Without an emotionally solid base, I had no sense of selfpreservation and took risks, which resulted in my ending up in many situations that were unhealthy, if not outright dangerous,” Lane said.

She said she identified with her victimized relatives in Europe. “I grew up wanting to know everything about how people could do this to other people,” she said. She devoured books about the Nazis, as well as the works of Primo Levi and other Holocaust authors. Her obsession continues to this day.

“I was just watching something on TV about recently uncovered jewelry and other assets of the prisoners who perished,” she said, while expressing the desire to register for the newly released records of victims available at Yad Vashem.

Her daughter, too, has been affected by interest in her Jewish roots. “She stayed in Israel for two months, well beyond the Birthright two-week limit,” said Lane, who said that her daughter experienced something akin to a lightning bolt striking her body when she first visited the Western Wall.

Her performance this weekend will be at the Real School of Music in Burlington. “Robin is one of the greatest female artists ever to emerge from the Boston music scene,” the school announced in an email that includes a video of her singing her hit “When Things Go Wrong” at the legendary Kenmore Square rock den the Rathskeller (or “The Rat,” as it was called) just before she achieved national acclaim.

Lane had moved to Boston early in her career, drawn by musician friends. “I played my singer/songwriter type songs all over Boston, at colleges and similar venues.” Like many aspiring musicians in the late ’70s/early ’80s, she started hanging out at the Rat. “I found the members for my band, a manager, and a record deal with Warner Bros.,” she said.

Lane said that Songbird Sings, which became a nonprofit in 2009, is based on A Woman’s Voice, a therapeutic technique she developed at a community health center in Turners Falls.

“It was serendipitous,” she recalled. “I happened upon a women’s drop-in center writing group that followed the Amherst Writers and Artists method.” Pioneered by authors Natalie Goldberg and Brenda Ueland, this approach encourages students to express ideas and memories.

Lane had herself been teaching at The Brick House in Turners Falls for youth-at-risk. She used “The Artist’s Way,” which promoted “creative unblocking.” The course was created by Julia Cameron, a former addict and the second wife of director Martin Scorsese.

The women at the center asked Lane if she would teach them how to write songs. “I had no idea what I was getting myself into,” Lane said, noting that all the women were survivors of trauma.

“There is a centrality of trauma, beginning with childhood abuse, progressing to adult domestic abuse, often covered up with addictions,” she said. “And I understood what it was all about.”

She currently teaches workshops at Roxbury Youth Works and the Home for Little Wanderers, both in Dorchester, and at the Western Massachusetts Correctional and Alcohol Center in Springfield.

In the works is a documentary on Lane called “A Woman’s Voice: The Film,” spearheaded by her drummer and manager, Tim Jackson.

If you miss her in Burlington, Lane will appear Dec. 16 at the Brooklyn Coffee and Tea House in Providence and on Jan. 14 at the Hot Stove Cool Music concert – produced by Theo and Paul Epstein’s Foundation to Be Named Later – at the Paradise Lounge in Boston.

Robin Lane performs Dec. 3 at 7 p.m. at the Real School of Music in Burlington. Visittherealschoolofmusic.com　or call 888-881-7325.