Bill Murray, on making new friends and conquering new worlds

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If we've learned anything from following the career of William James Murray, it is that he should not be underestimated. Gaining fame from his stint on Saturday Night Live, followed by roles in comedy classics Ghostbusters and Groundhog Day, Murray turned heads with dramatic performances in such films as 2003's Lost in Translation.

Now, he's collaborated with the cellist Jan Vogler on New Worlds,  Murray, Jan Vogler and Friends – New Worlds,an album of show tunes, spoken word and ensemble pieces. Currently on tour to support the album, with a stop at Toronto's Koerner Hall this weekend, Murray spoke to The Globe and Mail from the California desert.

You're driving in the California desert right now. Isn't that where you were inspired to record When Will I Ever Learn To Live In God?, by Van Morrison?

Yes. I was driving through a pass that was normally dusty and windblown. The car I was driving had this Van Morrison disc in it, with that song. I hadn't heard it in a long time. The desert had had an unusually heavy amount of rain. It was abloom with flowers.

As I came over the pass, there were hundreds of people who had come out to see the flowers at sunset.

I saw their faces looking at the sun and kept playing the song over and over again. It really cracked my head open.

I think you might crack people's heads open with your version of that song and the album in general. Can you talk about surprising people and doing the unexpected over your career?

Well, I think I disappoint as many people as I surprise on a daily basis. But I was trained at Second City and we were trained to be actors. The idea was to be able to do a lot of different things, and I can sing a little bit. So, it's fun to be able to combine these skills on this project. I've had a fair amount of practice and I'm fortunate enough to be playing with musicians who are so much more talented than I.

Are you keeping up?

Well, let's say their reflected light is very flattering to me.

When I see someone swerving a bit out of one's lane, and not worrying about disappointing people, I think of Neil Young.

Neil is a true artist. He doesn't do it to intentionally disappoint. It's not why he wakes up in the morning. He just knows there are certain people who want him to play Cinnamon Girl over and over again. But he is constantly amusing himself. He is constantly challenging himself. He's iconic because he does not pander. I'm pretty much the same way, just not on that level.

What do you want audiences to get from the concerts you, Jan and the others are doing?

We just want a reaction. I once brought a young friend to a play, in which a great actress comes down with uterine cancer or something like that. The young guy next to me just bursts out laughing. When we saw the actress after the show, I told her "This is the knucklehead who broke up laughing." She said all anyone could look for was a response. And that you can't tell people how to respond. "We want to touch them," she said.

Do you get the sense you guys are touching people?

I think so. But we can't pretend our presentation is any greater than the artists we're representing – Mark Twain, Ernest Hemingway, Walt Whitman, Leonard Bernstein, Bach, you know? Just throwing these people out there on stage demands a certain amount of attention. Jan put this together, and people will get what they get from it. But the original artists, they're the muscle of it. They're doing the heavy lifting, as they say. We're just the vehicles of their work.

Bill Murray, Jan Vogler and Friends – New Worlds, at Koerner Hall on Oct. 13, is sold out.

This interview has been editedand condensed.