American folk guitarists

Question

This piglix contains articles or sub-piglix about American folk guitarists

Answer 1

Mark Fosson

Mark Fosson is a singer-songwriter and American Primitive guitarist who grew up in Kentucky, where he began writing songs while he was still in his early teens. In the late 1970s he sent some song demos to John Fahey's West Coast-based Takoma Records, and Fahey, impressed with what he heard, offered Fosson a recording deal. Fosson lost no time in relocating to Los Angeles and began recording, but as bad luck would have it, Takoma was in some difficulty, and the label soon folded. Fahey allowed Fosson to retain the master tapes of the sessions, however.

Now located on the West Coast, Fosson met fellow songwriter Edward Tree, and the two began working together, forming the Bum Steers, a country-tinged group, in the late 1980s, eventually being invited to play the Grand Ol' Opry at the request of Porter Wagoner. Fosson's material appeared on several soundtracks through the 1990s.

In 2001 he began collaborating with singer-songwriter Lisa O'Kane, who recorded several of his songs, including the No. 1 European single "Little Black Cloud" and Fosson also began recording a solo project, Jesus on a Greyhound, which was released on New Light Entertainment/Universal. The record drew positive reviews and Fosson was frequently compared to Americana music artists like Ramblin' Jack Elliot, Joe Ely, John Prine and Guy Clark. The Fahey material finally saw the light of day as The Lost Takoma Sessions from Drag City Records in 2006. His song "Another Fine Day" is included on Volume 3 of the highly acclaimed Imaginational Anthem acoustic guitar compilation from Tompkins Square Records.

On June 26, 2012 Tompkins Square released "Digging In The Dust", a collection of early home recordings which led to Fosson's signing to Takoma Records.

In May 2015 he released "kY", his newest collection of instrumentals.

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Answer 2

Ruthie Foster

Ruthie Cecelia Foster (born February 10, 1964) is an American singer-songwriter of blues and folk music. She mixes a wide palette of American song forms, from gospel and blues to jazz, folk and soul, and her live performances are powerfully transfiguring. (www.allmusic.com) She has often been compared to Bonnie Raitt and Aretha Franklin.

Foster is from Gause, Texas and comes from a family of gospel singers. At the age of fourteen, Ruthie was a soloist in her hometown choir, and was certain that her future would revolve around music. After high school, Ruthie moved to Waco, Texas to attend community college, where her studies concentrated in music and audio engineering. She began fronting a blues band, learning how to command a stage in the bars of Texas.

Hoping to travel and gain a wider world perspective, Foster joined the Navy, and soon her musical talents soon had her singing in the naval band Pride, that played pop and funk hits at recruitment drives in the southeastern United States. Following her tour of duty, Ruthie headed to New York City where she became a regular performer at various local folk venues. Atlantic Records got wind of Foster's talent and offered her a recording deal, with the intent of cultivating her as a budding pop star, but Foster wasn't interested in a pop career, preferring instead to explore the various strains of American roots music that had informed her childhood. When her mother fell ill in 1993, Foster left New York and her recording deal and returned to Texas to be with her family. She began working as a camera operator and production assistant at a television station in College Station, Texas while she cared for her mother, who passed in 1996. A year later in 1997, Foster self-released the album Full Circle, the success of which paved the way to a long relationship with the record label Blue Corn Music.

Blue Corn released the follow up album Crossover in 1999, Runaway Soul in 2002, and Stages (featuring a series of live tracks) in 2004. Stages marked a turning point in Foster's career, as the experience of a Ruthie Foster live show was able to be experienced by a wide audience. Foster's next release was Heal Yourself in 2006, followed by the studio album The Phenomenal Ruthie Foster in 2008 (produced by Papa Mali), and The Truth According to Ruthie Foster (produced by Grammy-winning producer Chris Goldsmith), recorded at Ardent Studios in Memphis, in 2009, all released by Blue Corn Music.The Truth According to Ruthie Foster earned Ruthie a Grammy Award Nomination for Best Contemporary Blues Album. A second album of Foster's live performances, Live At Antone's (CD and DVD), was released in 2011. In 2012, Ruthie and Blue Corn released the studio album Let It Burn, which featured special guests The Blind Boys of Alabama, William Bell and the rhythm section of The Funky Meters, and was produced by Grammy-award winner John Chelew. Let It Burn earned Foster a second Grammy Nomination, this time for Best Blues Album, and was the vehicle for numerous Blues Music Awards won by Foster. Her most recent album, Promise of a Brand New Day, was released by Blue Corn Music in 2014.

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Answer 3

Jeffrey Foucault

Jeffrey Foucault

Jeffrey Foucault (born January 26, 1976) is an American songwriter and record producer from Butte, Montana, United States, whose work marries the influence of American country, blues, rock 'n' roll, and folk music. He has released four full-length solo albums under his own name and two full-band lyrical collaborations with poet Lisa Olstein, under the moniker Cold Satellite. Foucault has toured extensively in the United States, Canada, the United Kingdom and Europe since 2001, in both full-band and solo appearances. Since 2013 he has performed as a duo with drummer Billy Conway (Morphine, Treat Her Right).

Foucault's solo releases were previously issued by western Massachusetts-based independent label Signature Sounds, including Stripping Cane (2004), Ghost Repeater (2006) and Horse Latitudes (2011). His 2015 release, Salt As Wolves, was self-released on BlueBlade Records. His bands have featured or included Eric Heywood (Son Volt, Pretenders, Ray Lamontagne), Bo Ramsey (Greg Brown, Lucinda Williams, Pieta Brown), Billy Conway (Morphine), Jennifer Condos (Joe Henry, Sam Phillips), Jeremy Moses Curtis (Booker T), David Goodrich (Chris Smither), Van Dyke Parks (Harry Nillson, Ry Cooder, Ringo Starr) and Caitlin Canty.

Foucault has produced three albums for other artists, including Hayward Williams's The Reef (2014), Caitlin Canty's Reckless Skyline (2015) and John Statz's Tulsa (2015).Don Henley performed Foucault's song, "Everybody's Famous", during his 2011 tour of California, and Foucault's songs have appeared on the television shows Sons of Anarchy, and Nashville.

Foucault's 2015 release, Salt As Wolves, debuted at number 7 in the Billboard Top Blues Album Chart for the week of November 7, 2015.

Foucault lives in New England with his wife, fellow songwriter Kris Delmhorst.

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Answer 4

Paula Frazer

Reprise/Warner Bros. Records
4AD Records
Birdman Records
MRG Recordings

Paula Frazer is an American singer-songwriter. She grew up in Georgia and Arkansas and moved to San Francisco in 1981. Her music is frequently described as melancholic alternative country, but with an eclectic mix of folk, blues and pop, among other genres. She first came to notice by fronting the band Tarnation in the 1990s and has appeared on recordings and in concert with many bands and solo artists including Cornershop, Sean Lennon, Frightwig, Tindersticks, the Czars, and Handsome Boy Modeling School.

Before forming Tarnation, Frazer played with numerous SF bands, such as Cloiter, Virginia Dare, Frightwig, Trial, and Pleasant Day. Tarnation MK1 featured Brandan Kearney, owner of the SF NufSed label. Kearney didn't stay in the band for long, but he gave Frazer the chance to release Tarnation's debut. That first Tarnation record was called I'll Give You Something To Cry About, and initially appeared in an edition of only 1,000 copies. In 1995, 4AD released Gentle Creatures, an album featuring several songs off the previous album. Warn Defever (His Name Is Alive) helped in the production. Mirador appeared in 1997. One year later, Frazer dropped the Tarnation name and continued as a solo artist. In 2006 Frazer revived the Tarnation name and released her seventh record, Now It's Time in March 2007 under the name of Paula Frazer and Tarnation.

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Answer 5

Dean Friedman

Dean Friedman

Dean Friedman (born May 23, 1955) is an American singer-songwriter who plays piano, keyboard, guitar and other instruments, including the harmonica.

Born and raised in Paramus, New Jersey, Friedman received his first guitar when he was 9, in 1964, and started writing songs. When he was a teenager, he played weddings and bar mitzvahs as part of Marsha and the Self-Portraits, sent out demos and majored in music at City College of New York where one of his teachers was guitarist David Bromberg. By the time he was 20, in 1975, he had a manager and a recording contract with Cashman and West's Lifesong label.

In the United States he is described as a one-hit wonder, following his 1977 hit song "Ariel", which reached number 26 on the Billboard Hot 100 chart and stayed in the chart for five months. American Top 40 ranked it as the 87th biggest hit of 1977. On the Cash Box Top 100, it reached number 17. In Canada, the song reached number 19.

"Ariel" has been described as a "quirkily irresistible and uncategorizable pop song about a free spirited, music loving, vegetarian Jewish girl", from Paramus, New Jersey, where he grew up. It is the only Billboard Top 40 song to contain the word Paramus. It describes the girl Ariel, "standing by the [since dismantled] waterfall at Paramus Park", one of the many shopping malls in Paramus. The quarters she was collecting for "friends of BAI" refers to the New York radio station WBAI-FM, and their listener association, while the song also makes reference to "channel 2," which refers to local CBS affiliate WCBS-TV.

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Answer 6

Ruthann Friedman

Ruthann Friedman

Ruthann Friedman (born July 6, 1944) is an American folk singer.

Born in Bronx, New York, Friedman spent her formative years in the San Fernando Valley, north of Los Angeles after her family moved to Southern California when she was 10. She started playing guitar at the age of eight while listening to Woody Guthrie, Pete Seeger and Josh White.

After moving to California, Friedman recalled feeling "very isolated" with few friends, so she started playing guitar in her room. Her first song gained her a spot on the television talent show Rocket to Stardom at age twelve. While at Ulysses S. Grant High School, she started playing "Hoot Nights" at The Troubadour in West Hollywood, where she met the musicians Steve Mann and Hoyt Axton and became part of the growing musical scene of Los Angeles.

Her first paid performance was at the Green Spider Coffee House in Denver, Colorado at the age of nineteen. Soon she was part of the "Hippie Migration," traveling the California Coast and living off earnings from her performances. While staying in San Francisco, California, Friedman befriended the members of Jefferson Airplane, Country Joe and Janis Joplin. Her friendship with Van Dyke Parks not only influenced her deep commitment to music but also introduced her to The Association, who recorded her song "Windy" in 1967. Friedman wrote "Windy" in 20 minutes while living in an apartment in David Crosby's house.

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Answer 7

Jerry Garcia

Jerry Garcia

Jerome John "Jerry" Garcia (August 1, 1942 – August 9, 1995) was an American singer-songwriter and multi-instrumentalist, best known for his work with the band the Grateful Dead, which came to prominence during the counterculture era in the 1960s. Though he disavowed the role, Garcia was viewed by many as the leader or "spokesman" of the group.

One of its founders, Garcia performed with the Grateful Dead for their entire thirty-year career (1965–1995). Garcia also founded and participated in a variety of side projects, including the Saunders–Garcia Band (with longtime friend Merl Saunders), the Jerry Garcia Band, Old and in the Way, the Garcia/Grisman acoustic duo, Legion of Mary, and the New Riders of the Purple Sage (which Garcia co-founded with John Dawson and David Nelson). He also released several solo albums, and contributed to a number of albums by other artists over the years as a session musician. He was well known for his distinctive guitar playing and was ranked 46th in Rolling Stone's "100 Greatest Guitarists of All Time" cover story.

Later in life, Garcia was sometimes ill because of his diabetes, and in 1986 went into a diabetic coma that nearly cost him his life. Although his overall health improved somewhat after that, he also struggled with heroin and cocaine addictions, and was staying in a California drug rehabilitation facility when he died of a heart attack in August 1995.

Jerry Garcia's ancestors on his father's side were from Galicia in northwest Spain. His mother's ancestors were Irish and Swedish. He was born in the Excelsior District of San Francisco, California, on August 1, 1942, to Jose Ramon "Joe" Garcia and Ruth Marie "Bobbie" (née Clifford) Garcia, who was herself born in San Francisco. His parents named him after composer Jerome Kern. Jerome John was their second child, preceded by Clifford Ramon "Tiff", who was born in 1937. Shortly before Clifford's birth, their father and a partner leased a building in downtown San Francisco and turned it into a bar, partly in response to Jose being blackballed from a musicians' union for moonlighting.

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Answer 8

Vicki Genfan

Vicki Genfan

Vicki Genfan (born June 15, 1959) is an American multi-instrumentalist, fingerstyle guitarist, composer and singer.

Vicki Genfan took up the guitar at age five. Her father played 12-string guitar, mandolin and fiddle, and sang. Her older brother played guitar too. She studied classical music and jazz at Ithaca College in New York. Besides guitar, Genfan plays piano, banjo, hand percussion, and trombone.

In 1994, she produced her first album Native on cassette, but didn't sell it in commercially significant numbers. In 2001, she released a self-produced CD, Outside the Box. That same yeare, she won the Just Plain Folks Award for that album's title song, New Grass. In 2003, the German label Acoustic Music Records published Vicki Genfan Live, a live-recording at Open Strings Festival in Osnabrück, Germany. In 2004, Vicki Genfan placed second at Mountain Stage New Song Festival in West Virginia with her song, Eleanor. In 2006, Genfan published the double CD Up Close & Personal. The first CD in the set, Up Close, contains only instrumentals. The second, Personal, shows her singing and songwriting abilities.

Vicki Genfan had been on stage with several well-known fellow guitarists—including Tommy Emmanuel, Laurence Juber, Kaki King, and Jennifer Batten. Citing her technique and singing style, some have compared her to musicians such as Michael Hedges and Pat Metheny. Vicki Genfan featured in several American and international magazines, and was labeled "Queen of Open Tunings".

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Answer 9

Fred Gerlach

Fred Gerlach (August 26, 1925 — December 31, 2009) was an American folk musician and luthier, perhaps most famous for his recording of the traditional song "Gallows Pole", which Led Zeppelin guitarist Jimmy Page credited with inspiring his own band's version.

In the early 1950s he sang in the Jewish Young Folksingers chorus conducted by Robert De Cormier. Gerlach was among the first folk artists to adopt the 12 string guitar as his medium. A friend of fellow folk musicians Ramblin' Jack Elliott, Woody Guthrie and Pete Seeger, his first album was even called Twelve-String Guitar. Its flagship song, "Gallows Pole", was heard and covered by Led Zeppelin guitarist Jimmy Page, saying:

I first heard it ('Gallows Pole') on an old Folkways LP by Fred Gerlach, a 12-string player who was, I believe, the first white to play the instrument. I used his version as a basis and completely changed the arrangement

Gerlach was inspired to adopt the 12 string by his mentor and one-time roommate Lead Belly, a blues guitarist famous for using the instrument. At the time Gerlach became interested in the instrument, it was almost unknown. He later related:

I went into one of the largest musical instrument stores in the country, and the manager assured me that no such instrument existed. On another occasion a maker of fine 12-string lutes (nylon strings) pictured for me a nightmare of explosive force required to hold twelve steel strings in proper tension. He envisioned bits of guitar and guitarist flying asunder. I have combed New York City pawnshops and music stores and have received a variety of comments ranging' from 'Sorry, we're out of them now. Won't a six-string guitar do? to 'Have you got rocks in your head, buddy?' In fact, it took me about a year after I had first decided to play a twelve-string before I found one. It wasn't a concentrated search, but it nevertheless indicates the general unavailability of the instrument.

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Answer 10

Bob Gibson (musician)

Bob Gibson (musician)

Samuel Robert "Bob" Gibson (November 16, 1931 – September 28, 1996) was an American folk singer and a key figure in the folk music revival in the late 1950s and early 1960s. His principal instruments were banjo and 12-string guitar. He introduced a then-unknown Joan Baez at the Newport Folk Festival of 1959. He produced a number of LPs in the decade from 1956 to 1965. His best known album, Gibson & Camp at the Gate of Horn, was released in 1961. His songs have been recorded by, among others, the Limeliters, Peter, Paul and Mary, Simon & Garfunkel, the Byrds, the Smothers Brothers, Phil Ochs, and the Kingston Trio. His career was interrupted by his addiction to drugs and alcohol. After getting sober he attempted a comeback in 1978, but the musical scene had changed and his traditional style of folk music was out of favor with young audiences. He did, however, continue his artistic career with albums, musicals, plays, and television performances. In 1993 he was diagnosed with progressive supranuclear palsy (PSP), and died of that disease at the age of 64.

Gibson was born on November 16, 1931 in Brooklyn, New York, between his older sister, Anne, and younger brother, Jim. He and his siblings grew up in various communities outside New York City – Tuckahoe, Yorktown Heights, and Tompkins Corners. His early interest in music was, primarily, vocal. He left high school in his senior year and hitchhiked around the country.

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