A robin redbreast has alighted on Barbra Streisand’s windowsill. Sitting with Jay Landers, her A&R executive at Columbia Records for three decades, the multihyphenate legend, 83, is taking a moment amid her busy schedule to appreciate the little gifts nature provides. Her new album, The Secret of Life: Partners, Volume Two (out June 27), is her first since 2018’s Walls and a sequel to 2014’s Partners.
The duets project finds her singing old chestnuts (“The Very Thought of You” with Bob Dylan) and songs written by her collaborators (“My Valentine” with Paul McCartney and “Letter to My 13 Year Old Self” with Laufey). It also features a few new tracks, such as “To Lose You Again” with Sam Smith and “One Heart, One Voice,” a cross-generational collaboration for the ages that teams her with Mariah Carey and Ariana Grande; both songs were co-written by Walter Afanasieff, who co-produced the album with Peter Asher.
In your 2023 memoir, My Name Is Barbra, you wrote that Bob Dylan wanted to sing with you in the ’70s but you demurred. How did it feel finally singing with him?
Barbra Streisand: The interesting thing is that I saw it as an acting piece. It’s two different people, how they were feeling each other out: what kind of emotions are going on when two people have known of each other for such a long time but never met. It was wonderful to work with him, actually. I did my part earlier in the day, and it worked out perfectly with his. I’m ever the director. And he wanted direction, which was so lovely: “What do you think? What do you want?” He just was so open to trying this or trying that. It was really easy.
Both your careers began around the same time, just blocks away from each other 60 years ago in New York.
Streisand: I talked to him about our pasts; we never met but we were in Greenwich Village at the same time, finding our way, unknown — me at the Bon Soir [a defunct nightclub] and him with his guitars playing his clubs. It’s interesting we finally met.
Josh Groban features on “Where Do I Go From You” and is the only singer here who also sang on Partners. What is it about him?
Streisand: He had the voice for it. I always loved that song — it was from a Broadway play that never got onstage [Beba’s Mambo] — and somehow, we made it into a duet. Everybody who I worked with was wonderful. It was easy and enjoyable, which I loved about it. I hadn’t sung in a while, so I didn’t even know if my voice was going to show up. I gave a little prayer to God as I approached the microphone that first time, and somehow, even not having sung for a while, my voice was there.
How long had it been since you had sung prior to recording this?
Streisand: I can’t even imagine. When did I make my last album? I don’t keep track of myself, actually. Jay, do you know what my last album was before this?
Jay Landers: Your last album was Walls in 2018. Two years into the Trump administration.
And here we are again. How are you keeping sane during these times?
Streisand: Well, I write my tweets. I try to keep calm. I try to know time will go and things will change again. I have to keep hoping. You have to keep sanity in your mind. I pray a lot. Prayer helps, I’ll tell you that. That’s all I can do right now.
This story appears in the June 21, 2025, issue of Billboard.
