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Susan Cowsill was once the sweet little girl who banged a tambourine for her family's singing group, the Cowsills.
During the heyday of that family band, the group collected a string of hits, such as "The Rain, the Park and Other Things" and "Hair." It may be best known, though, as the band that inspired TV's The Partridge Family.
Cowsill's Tulsa connection is that she lived here in the mid-'80s. She also sang harmonies with local singer Dwight Twilley on such tunes as his 1984 ditty "Girls," which also featured Tom Petty.
Now in her mid-40s, Cowsill has released her debut solo album "Just Believe It."
Its sound is tinged with everything from pop to alt-country and features backing vocals by the likes of Lucinda Williams and Counting Crows' singer Adam Duritz.
Career-wise, Cowsill is making people forget she was once a little tambourine girl. But, like so many others who call New Orleans home, Cowsill is homeless now.
Before the Hurricane Katrina, you could find Cowsill and her family in their two-story, blue-with-white-trim shotgun house situated right smack-dab in the middle of New Orleans.
It was once a place where a happy family created happy memories. Now it's just a place the Cowsills once called home.
The family lived upstairs while downstairs was reserved for storing things such as Cowsill's precious photo albums that go back to when her grandmother was a child.
Those photo albums, like so many other things, were destroyed in the hurricane.
Those pictures and everything else were just worldly goods, though.
"You know, quite honestly, it's a material object," she said. "The photos, those are captured memories. A lot of those we still have in our heads anyway."
Luckily, Cowsill was in Tulsa playing a two-night stand at The Venue with Twilley before Katrina hit New Orleans. And thanks to a busy touring schedule, she's been on the road ever since.
When she does settle at times, home is the studio in Lafayettte, La., where she recorded "Just Believe It."
Although Cowsill and her household are safe, Cowsill's brother, Barry, has been missing since the hurricane.
In this uncertain and tragic time, Twilley set up a way to donate money to his longtime friend.
Donations can be sent to: Susan Cowsill c/o Jan Twilley, 4306 S. Peoria Ave., Suite 642, Tulsa, OK.
Twilley will continue raising money for Cowsill on Sunday when he plays his brand of Beatles-influenced power pop at The Venue. The event will raise money for Cowsill and countless other Katrina victims.
Twilley will kick off the fundraiser by donating $2,000 to the American Red Cross, and he'll autograph a guitar to be auctioned off.
The benefit show for Cowsill and the American Red Cross will serve a noble cause, but it won't be a somber affair.
"It will be a wild, rock 'n' roll show," Twilley said in a telephone interview.
When Cowsill recently called from her van, which she's driven 13,000 miles since Aug 31, Cowsill and her husband, Russ, were on the road out of New Orleans, bound for a gig in Indianapolis.
As that van cruised down the road, Cowsill said she could see a causeway, which rises high above water, that had "big chunks of it blown out."
Although Katrina soundly beat New Orleans, Cowsill knows her city will rise again.
"New Orleans has a long way to go, but it will only come back if we come back. Because we are New Orleans," she said. "I understand a lot of people don't feel like pioneering, and I understand that. So we'll just get it all ready for them and have them come home for a big party."
Actually, Cowsill believes all things happen for a reason.
"Everything is as it should be, including this freaking hurricane," she said, "because a lot of good is going to come out of this. We need a lot of help down here and we always have; it's just nobody noticed before. Now they're going to notice us and we're going to get a lot of the help we should have been getting all along."
Who:
Susan Cowsill and American Red Cross benefit show featuring Dwight Twilley, Hurricane Mason, the Desert Wind Belly Dancers, the Mike Tyson Project, Llyfyrion and Mercury Retrograde
When:
Outdoor family events start at 4 p.m., indoor show starts at 6 p.m., Sunday
Where:
The Venue, 18th Street and Boston Avenue
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