Alison Brown
| Alison Brown | |
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| Background information | |
| Born | August 7, 1962 |
| Origin | Hartford, Connecticut, United States |
| Genres | Bluegrass, Americana, jazz |
| Occupation(s) | Songwriter, musician, Record Producer |
| Instruments | Banjo, guitar |
| Years active | 1978–present |
| Labels | Vanguard Records, Compass Records |
| Associated acts | Alison Krauss, Union Station, Béla Fleck, David Grisman, Stuart Duncan, Sam Bush, Northern Lights |
| Website | alisonbrown |
Alison Brown (born August 7, 1962) is an American banjo player and guitarist known for a soft nylon-string banjo sound. She has won and has been nominated for several Grammy awards and is often compared to another banjo prodigy, Béla Fleck, for her unique style of playing. In her music, she blends jazz, bluegrass, rock, blues as well as other styles of music.
Born in Hartford, Connecticut, Brown learned to play guitar at eight and banjo at ten. When she was twelve, she met fiddler Stuart Duncan. In the summer of 1978, Brown traveled across the country with Duncan and his father, playing at festivals and contests. She won first place at the Canadian National Banjo Championship, which helped her land a one-night gig at the Grand Ole Opry.
In 1980, Brown went to Harvard university, where she studied history and literature. After graduating from Harvard, she earned an MBA from UCLA.
In 1982, while still at Harvard, Brown helped to reunite the Northern Lights band after a 5-year hiatus, she became a band member until 1984, when she moved back to California. Brown worked for two years with Smith Barney in San Francisco, and then took a break to pursue her music interests.
In 1987, Alison Krauss asked Brown to join her band, Union Station. Brown spent three years with Krauss. In 1990, she moved to Tennessee, and was named International Bluegrass Music Association Banjo Player of the Year in 1991. The 1990 album I've Got That Old Feeling, which Brown played banjo on, won a Grammy award.
In 1992, Brown became the band leader for Michelle Shocked. This experience led Brown to merge bluegrass with jazz and folk idioms, in a manner similar to those of Béla Fleck and David Grisman.
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