Top Folk Pop Artists on Rhapsody Online

David Gray

Fri, 27 Nov 2009 10:25:37 -0800

Welsh singer-songwriter David Gray had enjoyed immense success in Ireland for years before the rest of the world caught up with him. His simple, acoustic-fronted songs are canvasses on which Gray paints emotions, with his hoarse vocals acting as the brush with which he recreates scenes from his soul. Leaving Wales to go to school in Liverpool, Gray drifted through various bands trying to find his place in the world of music. Eventually he started doing his own solo work and moved to London. He signed with Hut Records shortly thereafter, releasing A Century Ends in 1992 and Flesh in 1994. Despite strong reviews and some astonishing live performances, his music oddly failed to ignite and he was dropped by his label. He continued to play out live, and a performer-audience connection was forged in Ireland, where the crowds appreciated the singer's stark, emotional style. EMI snapped Gray up and in 1996, Sell, Sell, Sell was released. Again, the musician hit the road, this time in support of Radiohead and the Dave Matthews Band. But although the audiences were larger, sales stayed flat and he was dropped. Again. Thoroughly deflated, he went on a writing spree and with a "glass is half full" sort of optimisim, began recording his fourth album, White Ladder in his London studio apartment. The self-financed project was released on Gray's own IHT Records in 1998, and almost overnight found itself firmly lodged in the Irish Top-40, where it remained for quite some time. Dave Matthews, whom had befriended Gray on their earlier tour, signed him to his imprint label, ATO Records and released White Ladder stateside in 2000. American audiences warmed to the stirring single, "Babylon," and White Ladder went gold by the end of the year, and platinum a mere two months later. There was a glut of David Gray reissues in 2001 as well as The EPs 92-94, which consisted of three singles from A Century Ends, his very first single, "Birds Without Wings" and various other musical tidbits. This was quickly followed by 2002's A New Day at Midnight, which went gold for the singer-songwriter, despite the fact there wasn't another "Babylon" on the album. In 2005, Gray branched out from "bedroom recordings" and entered a proper recording studio with Marius De Vries (Rufus Wainwright, Madonna, U2, etc) producing. The resulting album, Life In Slow Motion, spills over with low-key but radio-friendly songs and an expansive aesthetic. - Linda Ryan

James Taylor

Wed, 2 Dec 2009 11:07:01 -0800

A folkie with a dark past, upbeat sound and clear pop inclinations, James Taylor was the poster boy for the '70s singer-songwriter movement. He had personal or professional ties to almost all of the era's stars, including Carole King, Joni Mitchell and Carly Simon -- his wife of more than a decade -- and several of his hits, including "Fire and Rain" and his cover of King's "You've Got a Friend," are definitive. Taylor came from a musical family -- three siblings were professional musicians -- and got his first break when Paul McCartney signed him to the Beatles' Apple Records in 1968. By then, he had already endured a 10-month stay in a psychiatric hospital for depression and was battling heroin addiction. That back-story colored his music. The collision of confessional songwriting and bright, catchy acoustic pop on Taylor's early records established the model for legions of folk-poppers. He continued racking up hits throughout the '70s with a combination of breezy originals and rootsy covers. The template has hardly changed in the ensuing decades, though hints of jazz and the classic pop songbook shine through on later albums. - Eric Shea

Counting Crows

Sat, 21 Nov 2009 13:42:41 -0800

Along with Kurt Cobain, Adam Duritz of Counting Crows will go down as one of rock's most recognizable voices of the '90s. Breathtaking in its range, his voice is more notable for its ability to convey nearly the entire spectrum of human emotion -- from elation to desolation. Eschewing fashion and production wizardry, the band's debut, August and Everything After, concentrated on powerful, intensely honest songwriting and timeless roots rock. It made a considerable impact on those within blasting radius of 20- and 30-somethings -- things just got a little more real. Duritz employs a dramatist's approach to songwriting -- in his work he takes on the personas of the damaged and the damned: the addicted, the lovelorn, the depressed. Remarkably, Duritz manages to handle his subjects with a compassion free of condescension; he makes their stories, as harrowing as they sometimes are, entertaining and inspiring. - Chad Driscoll

Simon & Garfunkel

Sat, 5 Dec 2009 10:33:44 -0800

When they were in the sixth grade together in Forest Hills, Queens, Paul Simon and Art Garfunkel discovered they could harmonize. What they then may not have realized was just how far their mellifluous voices would carry them. Throughout the latter half of the 1960s and early 1970s the duo's hooky pop-folk amalgam, literary lyrics, and, above all, exquisite harmonies propelled them to the top of the charts and established them amongst the era's most popular cultural icons.

The first songs Simon and Garfunkel sang together were doo-wop hits, but soon they were singing their own songs. One of those was "Hey, Schoolgirl," which the duo recorded in 1957. An agent of Big Records present at the session signed them on the spot. Calling themselves Tom and Jerry ("Tom Graph" and "Jerry Landis"), they had a Top 50 hit with "Hey, Schoolgirl" and appeared on American Bandstand. (In a 1984 Playboy interview Simon asserted that the record company agent used payola to get the record played.) Garfunkel estimates the record sold 150,000 copies. When a few follow-ups flopped, Tom and Jerry split up. When they met again in 1962, Garfunkel was studying architecture after trying to record as Arty Garr, and Simon was studying English literature but devoting most of his time to writing and selling his songs. In 1964 Simon, who had just dropped out of law school and quit his job as a song peddler for a music publishing company, took one of his originals to Columbia Records producer Tom Wilson. Wilson bought the song and signed the Everly Brothers–influenced duo.

Wednesday Morning, 3 A.M. — a set that combined traditional folk songs with Simon's originals and Dylan anthems like "The Times They Are A-Changin'," performed solely by the two singers accompanied by Simon's acoustic guitar — was lost in the glut of early Dylan imitators. Simon went to work the folk circuit in London, where in May 1965 he recorded a solo album. Several months later, he was performing around England and the Continent when he received the news that Wednesday's "The Sounds of Silence" was the Number One single in the United States. It was not quite the song Simon and Garfunkel had recorded. Wilson (who had played a part in electrifying Dylan's music) had added electric guitars, bass, and drums to the original track. The remixed single was at the vanguard of "folk rock." Simon returned to hit the college circuit with Garfunkel and to record a second duo album. Along with the redubbed "Sounds of Silence," the album of that name comprised folk-rock remakes of many of the songs from Simon's U.K. solo album. The production was elaborate, an appropriate setting for Simon's self-consciously poetic songs and Garfunkel's angelic voice, and Simon and Garfunkel turned out to be acceptable to both teenagers (who found them relevant) and adults (who found them intelligent).

In 1966 they placed four singles and three albums in the Top 30 (the revived Wednesday Morning, Sounds of Silence, and Parsley, Sage, Rosemary and Thyme). "Homeward Bound" (Number Five), "I Am a Rock" (Number Three), and "Sounds of Silence" (Number One) reached the Top Five. Simon was not a prolific writer — most of the material on the first three Simon and Garfunkel albums had been composed between 1962 and 1965 — and once Parsley, Sage was completed, the duo's output slowed considerably. They released only two singles in 1967: "At the Zoo" (Number 16) and "Fakin' It" (Number 23). Simon was developing the more colloquial, less literary style he would bring to his later solo work; the first sign of it was the elliptical "Mrs. Robinson," composed for the soundtrack of The Graduate. The film and the soundtrack album were followed within two months by Bookends; "Mrs. Robinson" hit Number One in June 1968, Bookends soon afterward.

Simon and Garfunkel produced Bookends with engineer Roy Halee, who had worked on every Simon and Garfunkel session. (With Parsley, Sage, Halee had taken a major role in the arranging; it was Columbia's first album recorded on eight tracks.) "The Boxer" (Number Seven), Simon and Garfunkel's only release in 1969, was Columbia's first song recorded on 16 tracks.

Bridge Over Troubled Water took almost two years to make as the duo began pursuing individual projects. They often worked separately in the studio, and as their music became more complex they performed less often on stage. Their only appearance together in 1969 was on their own network television special. Around this period, Garfunkel's acting career began with a role in Catch-22. Soon after the record's release, Simon and Garfunkel staged a brief but very successful tour, which quieted rumors about a breakup, but by the time Garfunkel's second movie, Carnal Knowledge, and Simon's 1972 solo album came out, it was clear that their individual solo careers [see entries] were taking precedence.

The two left their joint career at its peak, though both have said that their initial intention was not to break up permanently but just take a break from each other. After reaching Number One in spring 1970, Bridge Over Troubled Water rode the charts for over a year and a half (spending ten weeks at the top), eventually selling over 13 million copies worldwide. The LP yielded three hit singles - the title song (a Number one hit, the biggest seller of their career), "Cecilia" (Number Four), and "El Condor Pasa" (Number 18) — and won six Grammys. In 1977 it was given the British Britannia Award as Best International Pop Album of the past 25 years, and the title song received the equivalent award as a single. To date the duo has sold more than 20 million albums in the U.S. alone.

Since 1970 the Forest Hills classmates have gotten together on a few notable occasions. The first was a benefit concert for presidential candidate George McGovern at Madison Square Garden, New York, in June 1972. (That occasion also saw the reunions of Peter, Paul and Mary and the comedy team of Mike Nichols and Elaine May.) In 1975 Simon and Garfunkel had a Top Ten hit single with "My Little Town," a song Simon wrote for Garfunkel and sang with him, which appeared on solo LPs by both. Garfunkel joined Simon to perform a selection of their old hits on Simon's 1977 television special, and the two got together again the next year in a studio with James Taylor to record a trio rendition of Sam Cooke's "(What a) Wonderful World." On September 19, 1981, Simon and Garfunkel gave a free concert for an estimated 500,000 fans in New York's Central Park, and in 1982, a double album, The Concert in Central Park, went platinum, peaking at Number Six. They embarked on an extended tour and began recording what was to have been a new Simon and Garfunkel album. Unable to resolve their creative differences, the two abandoned the project, and the material was released on the Paul Simon solo LP Hearts and Bones.

The pair performed several shows for charitable causes in the early Nineties, and in 1993 a smash 21-date sold-out run at the Paramount Theater in New York City, followed by a tour of the Far East. Though, technically speaking, these shows were not Simon and Garfunkel concerts (they performed together only in the first and last of the show's four segments; the balance was dedicated to Simon's solo work), fans seemed to feel otherwise. The two were inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 1990.

In February 2003, a decade after the duo's previous reunion, Simon and Garfunkel appeared together at the Grammy Awards show, where they performed "The Sounds of Silence" together and were presented a Lifetime Achievement award. That fall, they hit the road again for a two-month "Old Friends" tour that took them to 28 cities and resulted in the 2004 live album of the same name. Simon and Garfunkel reprised the tour that summer, ending with a performance at the Colosseum in Rome to a reported 600,000 fans, even larger than the audience at the 1981 Central Park show. Three years later, Simon won an award at the first PBS Gershwin Awards show, where he and Garfunkel performed "Bridge over Troubled Water." Whether for its exquisite craftsmanship or place as a musical-cultural touchstone, or both, the music Simon and Garfunkel created and recorded seems destined to endure.

Paul Simon

Fri, 4 Dec 2009 13:21:18 -0800

After the 1970 breakup of Simon and Garfunkel [see entry], Paul Simon went on confirm his stature as a first-rate songwriter and performer. His terse, exquisitely crafted songs have drawn on early rock & roll (particularly doo-wop), reggae, salsa, jazz, gospel, blues, New Orleans, and African and South American music, in some cases presaging the conscious blending of world music into mainstream pop by over a decade. He stands apart from most folk-based singer/songwriters of his generation in that he has created a wide-ranging body of work in which the purely musical vocabulary — of style, instrumentation, and sounds — is as evocative and as expressive as his lyrics and voice.

Simon had recorded solo in England between Simon and Garfunkel's first and second albums. On his first album after their breakup, Paul Simon (Number 4, 1972), he began working from a broader stylistic palette and playing with such celebrated artists as jazz violinist Stephane Grappelli; the first single, "Mother and Child Reunion" (Number 4, 1972) was cut in Jamaica; and "Me and Julio Down by the Schoolyard" (Number 22, 1972) showed a clear urban Latin influence. Although Simon had ventured outside the classic folk-rock idioms with Garfunkel ("Cecilia," "El Condor Paso"), as a solo artist he pursued these new directions in earnest while returning to such American genres as gospel on There Goes Rhymin' Simon (Number Two, 1973); "Loves Me Like a Rock" (Number Two) featured the venerable Dixie Hummingbirds on backup. That album also included "Kodachrome" (Number Two, 1973) and went on to sell two million copies. The next year's Live Rhymin' (Number 33, 1974) featured the Dixie Hummingbirds and the Peruvian folk group Urubama.

Despite their sometimes rocky relationship, Simon and Garfunkel never completely severed ties. They performed at a George McGovern fund-raiser in 1972 and Garfunkel was a frequent guest at Simon's concerts. In 1975 they collaborated on their first record since 1970's Bridge Over Troubled Water, the single "My Little Town" (Number Nine), which turned up on both Garfunkel's Breakaway and Simon's Still Crazy After All These Years (Number One, 1975). The latter, purportedly about the dissolution of Simon's first marriage, generated the hits "Gone at Last" (Number 23) (a duet with Phoebe Snow) and "50 Ways to Leave Your Lover" (Number One), and won a Grammy for Best Album of 1975.

Next Simon played a small nonsinging part in Woody Allen's Annie Hall in 1977, and started working in television, hosting Saturday Night Live and his own special. His Greatest Hits (Number 18, 1977) yielded the 1977 Number Five hit "Slip Slidin' Away." In 1980 Simon starred in One Trick Pony, for which he wrote the screenplay and soundtrack. The story of a journeyman rock & roller, Pony received mixed reviews and flopped at the box office, although the salsa-influenced "Late in the Evening" became a Number Six hit. In 1981 Simon reunited with Garfunkel again in Central Park; the concert was documented on a live album.

A year later, the pair toured together, intending to collaborate in the studio. When those plans fell through, Simon released Hearts and Bones (Number 35, 1983), the least commercially and critically successful work of his career to date. Including a collaboration with composer Philip Glass, the album failed commercially; and with the end of his second marriage, to actress Carrie Fisher, Simon reached a personal and professional low point.

Seeking inspiration, Simon traveled to South Africa in 1985 to explore its indigenous music, which he had been studying. After participating in the recording of "We Are the World," the all-star anthem for the USA for Africa hunger relief project, he began recording in Johannesburg. He emerged with Graceland, a dazzling collection influenced by South African dance music and featuring the vocal group Ladysmith Black Mambazo (for whom he'd later produce two albums), the Everly Brothers, and Los Lobos. Graceland scored Number Three in 1987 — a whimsical single, "You Can Call Me Al," reached Number 44 (and Number 23 in rerelease in 1987) — and won a 1988 Grammy for Album of the Year.

Recording in South Africa caused Simon to be blacklisted by the United Nations and the African National Congress (ANC) and to be picketed in concert by antiapartheid protestors. To his credit, Simon spoke at public gatherings, where he addressed his critics face to face and defended his actions, insisting that his motives in breaking the boycott on recording in South Africa were musical, not political. The UN and the ANC dropped their bans in early 1987 after Simon wrote the UN pledging to abide by the terms of their South African boycott. Simon then released a best-selling home video of the Graceland concert in Zimbabwe.

In 1990 The Rhythm of the Saints, incorporating strains of West African, Brazilian, and zydeco music, reached Number Four, and Simon and Garfunkel were inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. The next year, Simon hosted a free Central Park concert (at which Garfunkel was pointedly asked not to appear) that drew an estimated 750,000 people. In 1992 Simon married Edie Brickell [see entry], then the lead singer for the New Bohemians; he coproduced his wife's first solo album in 1994.

Simon performed a series of 16 concerts at the Paramount in New York City in the fall of 1993. A retrospective of his career, the concert event also included a reunion with Garfunkel. Over the years, Simon's charitable and social work has involved fundraising for Amazonian rain forest preservation, New York's homeless, and South African children. For his humanitarian efforts, the United Negro College Fund accorded him its highest honor in 1989. In 1997 Simon won an Emmy for a televised concert special (Paul Simon Special), received critical praise for the three-CD Simon and Garfunkel retrospective, Old Friends, and collaborated with Nobel Prize–winning author Derek Walcott on a Broadway musical. The show, The Capeman, based on the true-life story of a young Puerto Rican immigrant sent to jail for the murders of two Manhattan teens, failed financially. However, it received a Tony Award nomination for Best Original Score written for Theater, and its accompanying CD was warmly received.

In 1999 Simon toured with Bob Dylan; the former rivals were recognized as the premier American songwriters to have emerged from the 1960s. The following year, Simon released You're the One, a solid set of songs with no overarching conceptual framework. In 2001 he was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame as a solo artist.

He penned "Father and Daughter," the Oscar-nominated theme song for The Wild Thornberrys Movie in 2002, and was one of five recipients of the prestigious Kennedy Center Honors that year. In 2003, he and Garfunkel appeared together at the Grammys performing "The Sounds of Silence." The reunion was followed by a tour that fall. Two years later, all of Simon's solo albums, with extra tracks, were reissued individually and as a limited-edition boxed set. In 2006, a full six years after his previous solo album, Simon issued the aptly named Surprise, his collaboration with ambient-pop pioneer Brian Eno, followed by a solo tour. In 2007, Simon won the first Library of Congress Gershwin Prize for Popular Song. For the event he reunited with Garfunkel yet again, this time performing "Bridge over Troubled Water." In 2008 The Brooklyn Academy of Music presented a live retrospective of Simon's muisic entitled Hard Times: The Music of Paul Simon, a live three separate engagements with Simon and a wide-array of musicians including Hugh Masekela, Milton Nascimento, David Byrne, Grizzly Bear, and many others.

John Denver

Sat, 5 Dec 2009 10:33:47 -0800

If thrift store record bins are any sort of barometer, it would seem that every person in America at one time owned a John Denver record. By this same logic, you can also guess to say that they all tossed them out at the same time. At some point, John Denver went from being America's most loved singer-songwriter to being the punchline on late-night talk shows. Blame it on overexposure or his constant mugging with Muppets, George Burns, and other bloodless creatures. Eventually, his humanitarian concerns took precedence over his folk/pop. The author of such heart-on-a-sleeve snapshots as "Sunshine On My Shoulder" and "Rocky Mountain High" died in a plane crash in 1997. John Denver's real name was Henry John Deutschendorf. He was raised on many Air Force bases, but always loved and championed the outdoors. - Eric Shea

Jewel

Wed, 2 Dec 2009 11:07:03 -0800

Jewel Kilcher is a modern-day folknik who gained a huge cult following playing Southern California coffeehouses before signing to Atlantic in 1995. Her dynamic, sparkling voice can extend from a wood-nymph lightness to that of a sultry, soulful chanteuse. Born in Utah but raised in Alaska, Jewel began playing music with her parents at the early age of six. After graduating from Michigan's Interlochen Fine Arts Academy, she moved to San Diego, where she lived in the back of her van and began to focus on her music as a career. Jewel's late-'90s hits included "Foolish Games" (from the Batman and Robin soundtrack) and "Who Will Save Your Soul," co-written with singer-songwriter Steve Poltz of the Rugburns. Throughout the decade and into the new millennium, Jewel released a string of albums, yet her sales declined, despite critical praise and radio airplay. After the singer's sixth release, Goodbye Alice in Wonderland, Jewel was dropped by her label and took the opportunity to reinvent herself. Dating rodeo rider Ty Murray provided plenty of opportunities to be in Nashville, Tenn., and that is where Jewel recorded 2008's country effort, Perfectly Clear. - Linda Ryan

Fleet Foxes

Mon, 30 Nov 2009 10:00:43 -0800

Drawing from the music of their baby boomer parents, Fleet Foxes dissect the tunes and tones of pioneers like the Beach Boys, Simon & Garfunkel and Crosby, Stills & Nash to create a cushy center of feel-good harmonic pop shimmering with gospel, folk and baroque embellishments. Receiving comparisons to My Morning Jacket and Sub Pop labelmates like Band of Horses and Iron and Wine, the Foxes started getting plenty of buzz in their hometown of Seattle even before the release of their debut album in June 2008. Gathering myriad instruments including acoustic and electric guitars, tom drums, mandolins, bass pedals, organs, dulcimers and their own delicate voices, the quintet revere the traditions of their influences while flaunting their own astute flair for wide-open melodies and lullaby harmonies. - Stephanie Benson

Brett Dennen

Tue, 1 Dec 2009 09:47:09 -0800

Born in 1979 in the small town of Oakdale, Calif., Brett Dennen has evolved from a home-schooled kid to a nationally recognized singer-songwriter. Echoing folk-legends like Bob Dylan, James Taylor, Paul Simon and Taj Mahal, BD's music blends folk, afro-beats and reggae with campy melodies, shimmering vocals and unfeigned lyrics. His eponymous debut, released in 2004, remained undiscovered until his 2006 breakthrough album, So Much More , gained attention from heavyweights like John Mayer and Dave Matthews. Backed by drummer Randy Schwartz and ALO guitarist Dan "Chops" Lebowitz and bassist Steve Adams, BD opened for John Mayer for his 2007 summer tour with Sheryl Crow. He's also played shows with Xavier Rudd, Shawn Colvin, Jackson Brown and Ziggy Marley. - Sabrina Sutherland

Indigo Girls

Thu, 26 Nov 2009 11:28:40 -0800

Throughout time, there have been classic duos: Lenny and Squiggy, Cagney and Lacey, Hall and Oates. The Indigo Girls are no exception. Their pristine and luminary vocal harmonies alone make crowds hoot and holler. Each song has a totally different energy and tension. With their more lighthearted and witty songs, Emily Saliers and Amy Ray play off each other like a comedic duo. Other times, their songwriting and arrangements are so clever, you would think that the two fight crime on the side. Their musical relationship takes on many turns, loops, and jumps. Saliers' musical roots dig deep into Joni Mitchell's gentle song soil, while Ray's influences stem from a much harder background of influences, including the Pretenders and the Husker Dude, Bob Mould. - Eric Shea

Joni Mitchell

Thu, 26 Nov 2009 11:28:40 -0800

When it comes to women's music in the twentieth century, Joni Mitchell stands as the preeminent trailblazer. With musings in almost every genre, Mitchell paved the way for many other popular female singer-songwriters. Like many others, she got her start playing folk music in coffeehouses during the early 1960s. In 1967, Reprise Records released her self-titled acoustic debut. 1969 saw the release of her second album Clouds, followed in 1970 by the successful Ladies of the Canyon, which featured the chart-topping "Big Yellow Taxi." But it was the moody and cathartic Blue (1971) that put her on the map of musical genius: the album even inspired Bob Dylan to write "Tangled Up In Blue." Mitchell dialed up the jazz on Court and Spark (1974), which spawned three major hit singles -- "Free Man in Paris," "Raised on Robbery" and "Help Me." Throughout her career, Joni Mitchell has experimented and taken risks with her music. To this day, she continues to explore new ground and hark back to the old folkie ways that gave her snowball its first push. - Eric Shea

KT Tunstall

Wed, 2 Dec 2009 11:07:38 -0800

KT Tunstall was born just knowing she was meant for big things. The adopted child of two academics, born in the college town-cum-golf Mecca of St. Andrews, Scotland, the singer first tried her hand at children's theater, constructing dioramas. While she insists that she only showed marginal musical talent, she's forged a career as a recording artist out of a fierce determination, an engaging but offbeat personality, a knack for spotting telling moments in fractured relationships and then writing about them, and a great love for eccentric music. Tunstall, who was born Kate Victoria (the KT is both an affectation to hide her gender and a homage to PJ Harvey), taught herself guitar from a busker's book at the age of 16, when she spent a year abroad attending high school in Connecticut. Earning pocket change singing on the streets, she knew that her life would never be the same. "I never had a backup plan, nor did I want one," she insists in an exclusive interview with Rhapsody. Returning home to Scotland, she enrolled in the Royal Holloway College, where she studied music by day and listened to the seditious music of Lou Reed, the dark sadness of Billie Holiday, and the proud idiosyncratic rhythms of Tom Waits. She convinced a friend who played mandolin to enter a battle of the bands, and the duo won to everyone's surprise but her own. "I've always thought I was the golden child," she claims with only a little bit of irony, and much humor.

Now everyone agrees. Teaming up with noted producer Steve Osborne, who has been behind the boards with such notable talents as U2, Suede, New Order and Shaun Ryder, she crafted an album, Eye to the Telescope, that was both introspective and feral; a love letter to her physics professor father and a deconstruction of the small, telling moments in human relationships. "My lyrics look closely at relationships, what goes on when to people are sitting close together when no one is watching," she explains. But now everyone seems to be watching. Prominent fans like Flaming Lips' Wayne Coyne and the Cure's Robert Smith extol her talents and regularly attend her shows. She has been nominated for Britain's coveted Mercury Prize and a Brit Award for Best Female Solo Artist, but the real accolade is how a song like "Black Horse and the Cherry Tree" sticks in the listener's mind. "Our producer Steve Osborne said he didn't get much sleep making this record -- not because we worked such long hours, but because he said he couldn't get my songs out of his head," she says. Now that's a real barometer. - Jaan Uhelszki

M. Ward

Tue, 18 Aug 2009 09:14:43 -0700

The stuff that goes into any one of M Ward's bittersweet recordings contains a handful of rootsy musical traditions -- dusty, blues-inflected country; the rolling rhythms of early rock 'n' roll; the breezy shuffle of acoustic folk. Even though the elements suggest a traditionalist approach, it's the ease with which he navigates them that has helped Ward emerge as one of the most refreshing figures in the post-millennium indie folk scene. His first solo effort, Duet for Guitars #2, was released in 1999, eventually finding an audience beyond Portland through a handful of rereleases. With his sophomore record, 2001's End of Amnesia, and 2003's Transfiguration of Vincent (whose title is a nod to a record by one of Ward's primary influences, John Fahey), his elegant songwriting won international acclaim. His next pair of releases, Transistor Radio (2005) and Post-War (2006), followed in form but examined more robust production aesthetics. He began collaborating with actress Zooey Deschanel in 2006, and after releasing a 2008 record with her as She & Him, titled Volume One, he returned to his solo career with 2009's Hold Time. - Nate Cavalieri

Brandi Carlile

Fri, 13 Nov 2009 12:39:20 -0800

The beginning of Brandi Carlile's story has all the makings of a spectacular CMT movie of the week: a childhood spent in the isolated foothills of rural Ravensdale, Washington, teaching herself to sing by listening to Patsy Cline and daydreaming about appearing on the Grand Ole Opry -- until one day her momma got serious and took her to sing on a local country radio show, jumpstarting Carlile's career. Fast forward to the musical montage, where we find a 17-year-old Carlile developing an ear for rock, making a go of it in the big city (Seattle), gigging wherever she can, forming a band with twin brothers Tim and Phil Hanseroth, and gradually building a following out of sweat and determination and raw talent. But then Carlile goes and messes up the whole Sunday matinee movie plot. She skips over the drinking and the failed marriages and the senseless tragedy that usually flesh out these stories and heads straight for the big, triumphant climax: a deal with Columbia to record her self-titled debut and then a whirlwind tour, opening for big names like Chris Isaak and Tori Amos, all at the ripe old age of 23. Carlile headed into the studio with producer T-Bone Burnett to work on sophomore album, 2007's The Story. 2009's Give Up the Ghost featured a collaboration with Carlile's longtime idol, Elton John. - Rachel Devitt

Jim Croce

Sun, 22 Nov 2009 10:09:52 -0800

Bruce Springsteen owes a lot to the late, great Jim Croce. Not just on a singer/songwriter level, but that whole appealing-to-the-blue-collar-man-through-music thing was really Croce's idea first (or second if you count Woody Guthrie). Whether he was capturing a hauntingly passionate moment in a narrative or just playing a little acoustic boogie, Croce could tap into a multititude of musical styles while retaining his own signature urban-troubadour sound. Like many great songwriters, Croce began writing songs and singing while attending college, though he grew up listening to Dixieland jazz and teaching himself how to play guitar. He married his wife Ingrid after graduation and kept food on the table and a roof over their heads by working construction, taking on random teaching jobs and playing his music in small clubs and bars. It wasn't until he took a job writing songs for radio jingles that he was discovered by ABC/Dunhill records who released his 1972 hit album You Don't Mess Around With Jim. The most popular song on the album "Time In A Bottle" hit No. 1 on the charts, allowing him to record another album entitled Life And Times which yielded another No. 1 hit with "Bad, Bad Leroy Brown" in 1973. Croce died an untimely death that year in a plane crash, and though other recordings of his surfaced and were released posthumously, speculations of what he could have accomplished abound whenever anything is penned or produced about the man. He was survived by his wife Ingrid and son A.J. (who is a brilliant singer/songwriter in his own right). - Eric Shea

Sufjan Stevens

Sun, 29 Nov 2009 09:28:08 -0800

Through a handful of masterful LPs, a few self-perpetuated myths (he claims to have been left on his parent's Detroit doorstep in 1975) and a memorable name, Sufjan (pronounced "soof-yawn") Stevens has charmed the Dickies off America's underground. As if all that wasn't enough, the guy claims to have taught knitting to the blind.

Stevens first took the stage while a student at Michigan's Hope College with little-known Michigan indie act Marzuki, though he left the band in 1999 to embark on a solo career in New York City. His first record, A Sun Came, debuted in 2000 to modest critical acclaim; Enjoy Your Rabbit followed it up in 2001. But it was Stevens' stunning dedication to his home state, 2003's Greetings from Michigan: The Great Lakes State, that earned him a wide international following. Michigan's cleverly orchestrated songs and the songwriter's ambitions to release a record for each state of the union received loads of critical lip service and made Michigan a popular hit. Though its follow-up, Seven Swans, had no geographical themes, Stevens came back to the states for project 2005's Illinois. Two records came in 2006: a collection of outtakes, The Avalanche, and a sprawling three-disc collection of holiday music, Songs for Christmas. - Nate Cavalieri

Ani DiFranco

Tue, 6 Oct 2009 09:54:02 -0700

Ani DiFranco learned early to live by her wits. As a teenager, she worked her way around Buffalo, NY, folk clubs and relocated to NYC before she turned 20. Two things made her become a folksinger: It was cheap (all the overhead she needed was an acoustic guitar), and it didn't get in the way of her saying her piece. And she had a lot to say -- when she cut her first homemade tape, something to sell at the clubs she played, her guitar wasn't much more than a prop that she assaulted between breaths, but her words were fully formed, deeply personal, and rigorously political, and there were a lot of them. But she wasn't a folkie, and despite her looks, she wasn't a punk, either -- she was a complete, irreducible original.

Her first two albums were just girl with a guitar, and possibly the most arresting piece on them was "Not So Soft," where she laid the guitar down and just spoke her poem. But she already had all the mouth she would ever need, and she exuded enough presence to make you hang on her every word. A few years later, on Like I Said, she returned to those early songs, fleshing them out with newfound musical skills, but the improvement is minor. However, on Imperfectly, she starts working with other musicians, most notably drummer Andy Stochansky. This adds powder to the explosive "What If No One's Watching." But Di-Franco's own musicianship had also made a great leap forward, as on "If It Isn't Her," with just Ani playing quirky guitar and singing, "I have been playing/Too many of them boy-girl games/She says honey you are safe here/This is a girl-girl thing.

The albums that followed -- Puddle Dive, Out of Range, Not a Pretty Girl, Dilate -- are full of sharply observed lyrics and increasingly innovative music; it's a remarkable series of albums. Meanwhile, DiFranco's intense fan base grew large enough to put her self-released albums on the charts, leading to the inevitable two-CD Living in Clip, an extraordinary career summation selected from various concerts with her trio (Stochansky on drums, Sara Lee on bass). The set works both as a greatest-hits and as a performance showcase -- DiFranco's guitar, especially on "Out of Range," has the same urgency and definition that she's long demonstrated with her voice.

The next series of albums might be considered her progressive period: While the lyrics continue to reflect her political concerns, they are less clearly anchored in her personal life (or perhaps her personal life as a record-company exec just isn't interesting enough), but her expanding musical skills often make for compelling listening. Little Plastic Castle starts out with horns and a Latin beat, and winds up with the meditative "Pulse," with Jon Hassell on trumpet. Up Up Up Up Up Up is looser and jazzier, while To the Teeth meanders into rap ("Swing") and ska-punk ("Freakshow") and hard to say what else. The sprawling two-CD Revelling/Reckoning is less successful, its lyrics hiding behind the music instead of jumping out. The second live double, So Much Shouting, So Much Laughter, is a lot more fun, partly because it recycles a familiar songbook under the guise of documenting her new band with all the snazzy horns. But the set also restores some bite to her political songs, especially "Self-Evident," though even there she seems to have outgrown her early, intense fusion of the personal and the political, relegating her political impulses to the more conventional realm of protest songs. Another long protest-song poem, "Serpentine," adds topical relevancy to Evolve, but for once, the fancy music gets the best of the muted messages.

On the other hand, her all-solo move, Educated Guess, contorts her elegant wordplay over a sharply stinging acoustic guitar, then tortures both with birdlike vocal overdubs. The only pleasure here is when she just recites, or just plays.

The two Utah Phillips albums comprise a fascinating side project. The Past Didn't Go Anywhere starts with Phillips saying, "What I do is I collect stories," but then you notice that he's been sampled and looped -- folk music as mix tape. The music is decidedly unfolkie synth drums and New Age guitar, which Phillips talks and lectures and hectors over. Fascinating stories, too, especially the ones about desert-ing from the Korean War and finding pacifism as a 12-step program. And he's observant enough to quote an old geezer on his wife's New Age bookstore: "No matter how New Age you get, old age's gonna kick your ass." Fellow Workers dispenses with the trip-hop for tales of Mother Jones and Joe Hill and some old-fashioned labor struggle sing-alongs. Which just serves to remind us that one of DiFranco's most important innovations has been to build her own record label -- a rare case of a worker who owns the means of production. (TOM HULL)

From 2004's The New Rolling Stone Album Guide

Amos Lee

Thu, 3 Dec 2009 22:53:44 -0800

Amos Lee got his big break when Norah Jones invited him to be the opening act for her 2004 tour. Taking the stage with just an acoustic guitar, his soothingly smoky voice and a collection of the sweetest soul-folk grooves this side of Come Away with Me, Lee proved to be charmingly mellow enough to tame arenas full of rabid Norah Jones fans. In fact, he may even out-Norah Jones Norah Jones one day. Originally from Philadelphia and environs, Lee got his start as a performer while in college at the University of South Carolina. He picked up a guitar and, like James Taylor with soul, started writing songs steeped in the warm, easygoing sounds of '70s greats like Stevie Wonder, Bill Withers and John Prine. After graduating with a degree in English, Lee spent some time as an elementary school teacher before leaving the profession to wait tables, bartend and refocus his energies on music. He self-released two EPs before being picked up by Blue Note, which released his eponymous debut full-length in 2005 and Supply and Demand in 2006. - Rachel Devitt

Eric Hutchinson

Fri, 13 Nov 2009 12:39:07 -0800

Nanci Griffith

Tue, 17 Nov 2009 09:07:29 -0800

Lilith Fair has littered the landscape with acres of golden-voiced, confessional Singer-Songwriters. Don't let Nanci Griffith get lost amongst the chaff. The luminous Texan wrote and performed her beautiful mix of folk, country, and pop while Jewel was still modeling Underoos to her kindergarten chums. Griffith had a couple of minor country hits and earned the highest respect from such American peers as Emmylou Harris and John Prine, but their literate, intimate nature seem to have found an easier home in Ireland and Great Britain than America. Griffith isn't overshadowed one bit by performing songs by respected tunesmiths Bob Dylan and Townes Van Zandt on Other Voices, Other Rooms, a stunning document of overlooked songs.

Hootie & the Blowfish

Sun, 29 Nov 2009 09:28:17 -0800

Rising out of the ashes of Grunge and speaking directly to millions of people's feel-good inner child, this band was an unstoppable juggernaut by the time they released their major label debut, Cracked Rear View, in 1994. The record sold an unbelievable 13 million copies and catapulted what was essentially a bar band to the top of the heap. The band was hardly an overnight sensation, though, having cut their teeth with three self-released records and years of relentless touring the frat house and jam band circuit. Hootie's sound is a hodgepodge of R.E.M.'s pastoral new Southern Rock and a bunch of Classic Rock, filtered through lead singer Darius Rucker's burly vocals -- it couldn't have more mass appeal if it had been invented in a laboratory. Hootie & the Blowfish have consistently taken bands from their bar days on the road with them, which is really pretty cool -- whether you like their music or not. - Tom Heyman

Natalie Merchant

Wed, 2 Dec 2009 11:06:59 -0800

Beginning her career in 1981 as cofounder and front woman of ÃÂÃÂÃÂÃÂ80s/ÃÂÃÂÃÂÃÂ90s Folk-Pop luminaries 10,000 Maniacs, Merchant's enchanting alto has found recent prosperity in the medium of solo performance. Usually supported by a sparse, tasteful smattering of guitars, strings, piano, and light rhythms, Merchant's voice and songs have always been employed as vehicles for her social commentary, rather than high school dramatics or slacker-inspired, neo-existential angst. Her first two solo albums, Tigerlily in 1995, and Ophelia in 1998, have been major commercial successes. - Charles Hodgkins

Judy Collins

Thu, 26 Nov 2009 11:27:41 -0800

Judy Collins' sweet soprano is as much a part of the '60s as the Beatles or Motown. Dorm rooms reverberated with her interpretations of Bob Dylan, Leonard Cohen, and Joni Mitchell songs. She knew how to ferret out good tunes and many artists got their initial exposure through her versions -- Mitchell in particular. Collins changed her strategy in the 1970s. She started writing much of her own material and covered songs from country to rock to Broadway. During this period, she walked a high wire act between revolutionary statements, art songs, and what the public really wanted to hear. Collins has played it safe since then -- the classics fit her soaring vocal better than hymns to Che Guevara would. - Eric Shea

Kings Of Convenience

Sat, 28 Nov 2009 09:38:28 -0800

Hailing from Norway, the Kings of Convenience are the indie set's very own Simon & Garfunkel. Sometimes they sound like an acoustic version of Belle & Sebastian without any girls. But when these two are locked into perfect, close-harmony (Check out "Winning A Battle, Losing The War"), they can birth that third overtone harmonic.

Shawn Colvin

Fri, 20 Nov 2009 12:52:06 -0800

Shawn Colvin is one of the best, and first, of the current crop of female Singer-Songwriters who meld folky introspection with pop-rock hooks. She has found success in both Adult Alternative and Contemporary realms. - Rosemary Pepper

Aimee Mann

Sun, 22 Nov 2009 10:09:56 -0800

If you're expecting a '90s dance version of 1985's "Voices Carry" to pop up anywhere in Aimee Mann's repertoire, don't bother. The organic, earthy acoustic trills of Mann's solo sound are a world apart from the synthesized New Wave of 'Til Tuesday, the ÃÂÃÂÃÂÃÂ80s band with which she initially gained fame. Instead, her songs are quiet, minimalist folk tunes that glisten like acoustic gems, free of embellishments and frills. Near-whispers and softly sung vocals float listlessly, giving a bittersweet edge to Mann's melancholic lyrics. Hers is the sort of music that existed long before Lilith Fair came along and equated folk with tea candles and herbal tea.

Don McLean

Sat, 5 Dec 2009 10:33:46 -0800

Just as Mike Lookinland will always be known for playing the part of Bobby Brady in the popular Sherwood Schwartz televised situation comedy The Brady Bunch, Don McLean will forever be the guy who wrote the classic hit song "American Pie." When you write a song as epic as that one, how can anything else match up? Like many other singer-songwriters of his era, McLean was a New York City village folknik who got his start in the same coffee houses as Fred Neil and Pete Seeger. By 1970, he had already penned "Vincent," his soft rock ode to Van Gogh, but it didn't hit until after he scored with the career defining "American Pie," an eight-minute long epic tribute to the life and music of Buddy Holly. The timely song struck a chord with a nation still bruised by Vietnam and the Nixon administration. Young America's reaction to this song was to adopt it as a pacifist's anthem. Roberta Flack's hit "Killing Me Softly With His Song" was in fact about her reaction to first hearing "American Pie." McLean never had anything close to the success of that hit, but the man stuck to his guns and refused his record label's request to try and recreate another "American Pie." As a result his career spiraled downward ever since, although it's probably safe to assume that the royalties for his monumental contribution to popular culture keep him afloat. - Eric Shea

Suzanne Vega

Sat, 5 Dec 2009 10:33:47 -0800

Suzanne Vega's career as a singer-songwriter has reached the 20-year mark with a series of introspective and often adventurous albums that have been well-received by critics and listeners, but she is perhaps best remembered for her 1987 No. 2 hit "Luka," which still gives birth to discussion as to whether its subject is spousal or child abuse. After gaining notoriety on the Greenwich Village club scene, Vega made her debut with a self-titled 1985 album at a time when an acoustic-based artist -- even one so impeccably produced (in Vega's case, by Patti Smith Group guitarist Lenny Kaye and Steve Addabbo) -- was a rare thing on a major label (A&M). While not a massive hit, her debut album achieved solid success with the college crowd, which embraced such tracks as "Marlene on the Wall" and "Some Journey." Vega cemented her reputation by touring, and by the end of '85, she had debuted "Luka" onstage.

Kaye and Addabbo returned for Solitude Standing, released two years after the debut. They set "Luka" in a shimmering, radio-ready frame that broadcasters took to immediately, and the album eventually went platinum. (Interestingly, the LP was an early credit in singer/writer Shawn Colvin's discography; the author of "Sunny Came Home" contributed backing vocals.) Vega's next album, 1990's Days of Open Hand, wasn't as big a seller as Solitude Standing. But in one of the flukes that makes the record industry such a rich pageant for observers, Vega scored another radio hit when British dance-music production team DNA provided the a cappella Solitude opener "Tom's Diner" with a bopping track. An international smash, the single led to an entire CD of related remakes. The new musical context provided by DNA may have encouraged Vega's own experimental tendencies, which surfaced most compellingly on 1992's 99.9F, produced by then-husband Mitchell Froom (Los Lobos, Crowded House). Froom also produced 1996's Nine Objects of Desire. Tried and True, a "best of" collection, appeared in 1999, and Songs in Red and Gray, her first work after her divorce from Froom, was released in 2001. Vega responded to the September 11 attacks -- in which her brother Tim might have been killed had he not called in sick that day -- with the Vigil Project, which issued a disc that included songs by Vega, Christine Lavin, Jack Hardy and many others. - Jaan Uhelszki

The Weepies

Wed, 18 Nov 2009 13:06:28 -0800

Though he was likely excited to play his first gig out of town, there's no way singer/songwriter Steve Tannen had an inkling that a 2001 gig in Boston would profoundly change his life. Then living in New York, Tannen was getting his career as a solo artist off the ground when he drove up to take the stage with Deb Talan, another singer/songwriter enjoying growing audiences in Cambridge, Mass. After the gig, they retired to Talan's apartment, where they shared a bottle of wine, played songs and sparked the beginning of a band and a romance. Their band, the Weepies, was first minted on 2003 LP Happiness, which collected songs that they had stored up as solo artists. Their regional success on the singer/songwriter circuit swelled, and after selling out a gig at New York City's Living Room in 2005, they were signed to Nettwerk Music Group, which would issue their sophomore LP, Say I Am You, later that year. The LP enjoyed great success on digital music charts and a number of commercial placements. In 2007 they moved to California, had a baby and co-wrote a record with Mandy Moore, Wild Hope. The Weepies tacked their third LP at home for a 2008 release. - Nate Cavalieri

SHeDAISY

Tue, 3 Nov 2009 11:25:02 -0800

With their farmer's daughter good looks, traditional instrumentation, flirty pop songs and flawless harmonies, it's easy to pan female country trio SHeDAISY as riding shotgun on the Dixie Chicks' bandwagon. But truth be told, Kelsi, Kristyn and Kassidy Osborn are blood sisters who've been singing and playing music together since they were little kids performing for friends and family outings. They never really played as a professional act until the late '90s, when they honed their three-part harmonies and relocated to Nashville. Lyric Street released The Whole Shebang in 1999, yielding three chart toppers that helped their debut go platinum. Their sophomore effort, Knock on the Sky, was released three years later with much less success, but 2004's Sweet Right Here unleashed the unstoppable single "Passenger Seat," which put them right back at the top of the country charts. - Eric Shea

Lenka

Thu, 19 Nov 2009 15:24:33 -0800

If it isn't already, "timing is everything" ought to be Lenka's motto. After spending time in art school and with Sydney band Decoder Ring, the Australian singer-songwriter (born Lenka Kripac) hopped on a plane for Los Angeles and arrived just in time for what we'd like to call the Feist-icization of pop. The warm, intimate vocals, oh-so-slightly cheeky lyrics and quiet whimsy of the brand of soulful pop-folk popularized by the likes of Ingrid Michaelson and Colbie Caillat suited Lenka just fine. After some early rave reviews but little actual exposure, Lenka's version of the coffee-shop pop trend started to take off with singles like "Follow" and "The Show." - Rachel Devitt

Rickie Lee Jones

Thu, 26 Nov 2009 11:28:40 -0800

Rickie Lee Jones' story starts off like almost any modern day Nashville starlet; only she left home at an early age in the 1970s to waitress in Los Angeles instead of Music City. And rather than hooking up with Harlan Howard or Kris Kristofferson, she bonded with a young Tom Waits who shared her adoration for jazzy folk songs, gripping narratives and beatnik styled live monologues. She busted out with her self-titled debut in 1979 and hit high on the charts with the jazzy R&B folk pop hit "Chuck E's in Love," a rhythmically constructed ditty about singer/songwriter Chuck E. Weiss (an obsession of hers who would find his way into many more of her lyrics). Although she has been compared to Joni Mitchell time and time again, Jones' songs are much more rooted in free-form arrangements (as much as free-form can be arranged) as well as elastic vocal inflections that exude more style and grace than vocal gymnastics. But she's also quite the powerful balladeer as heard on the romantic and wistful "On Saturday Afternoons In 1963." - Eric Shea

Jose Feliciano

Fri, 4 Dec 2009 13:19:34 -0800

One of the few artists to have hits in both English and Spanish, Jose Feliciano is an easily identifiable pop icon. As a blind singer and guitarist, he first received attention playing in the coffeehouses of Greenwich Village while still in high school. His passionate, soulful voice and Flamenco guitar embellishments catapulted him into the pop mainstream, and his version of the Doors' "Light My Fire" topped the hit parade in 1968; he even performed the national anthem at the World Series that year. He could be seen regularly on network television in the 1970s performing songs such as "Feelings." A prolific recording artist, he recorded light versions of popular rock songs that were embellished with strings and marketed to mature audiences. Although first cast under the American spotlight, he ended up more popular with Latino audiences. - Robert Leaver

Crosby Loggins

Wed, 18 Nov 2009 13:05:58 -0800

Tracy Chapman

Wed, 25 Nov 2009 11:50:53 -0800

In an era when the political Singer-Songwriter looked like it was going the way of the dodo bird and Reaganomics was in full robber-baron swing, along came Tracy Chapman. With her sensitive, well-crafted narratives and a voice as rich as the Mississippi Delta, Chapman re-introduced nuanced social commentary into pop music. Though her more self-consciously radical albums didn't fare as well as her 1988 self-titled debut, the hit song "Fast Car" became an instant classic with its heart-stopping vibrato and incisive lyricism. Chapman returned in the late '90s with the retro Acoustic Blues number "Give Me One Reason," which captures a slow burn rivaled only by R&B great Irma Thomas. Chapman's latest work continues in the same vein -- full of contained yet forceful emotion and refreshing, socially engaged subject matter. - Sarah Bardeen

Bruce Cockburn

Fri, 13 Nov 2009 12:39:05 -0800

Bruce Cockburn has been one of Canada's major stars for the past thirty years. A literate singer-songwriter, he has broken through to American audiences a number of times: baby boomers turned 1979's "Wondering Where the Lions Are" into a hit, "If I Had a Rocket Launcher" made heavy rotation on MTV and AOR radio, and the alterna-rock generation went for "Call it Democracy" in a big way. For the past decade, Cockburn's sound can be likened to Daniel Lanois-produced Dylan or Robbie Robertson. His records are beautifully crafted, and each one has at least a couple stand-out tracks that feature exquisite musicianship. His spoken word pieces, however, don't equal his alternately personal and topical songs. His work is greatly admired by Lucinda Williams, Ani DiFranco, and T-Bone Burnett, and all three have recorded with him. Cockburn deserves such distinguished company. - Nick Dedina

Janis Ian

Thu, 26 Nov 2009 11:28:39 -0800

Folk stalwart Ian continues her renewed career, delivering bluesy, articulate Folk-Pop with slick production and elaborate guitar work.

Glen Hansard and Marketa Irglova

Wed, 28 Oct 2009 10:44:28 -0700

The vocation of Irish-born singer and songwriter Glen Hansard has a timeless charm. As a teen, he quit school to busk in the streets of Dublin and rambled from one project to the next before eventually putting together an internationally acclaimed rock band, the Frames, and embarking on distinguished careers as an actor and solo artist. His first venture as a solo act came in 2006, when he joined Czech singer and multi-instrumentalist Marketa Irglova to issue the critically acclaimed The Swell Season. Though both were untrained as actors, Hansard and Irglova starred in director John Carney's independently released musical Once, which was nominated for two Grammys; its heartrending central tune "Falling Slowly" won the Oscar for Best Song in 2008. - Nate Cavalieri

Dar Williams

Thu, 26 Nov 2009 11:28:40 -0800

A staple of the New England folk scene, Dar Williams wrote her first song at age 11, and to this day draws comparisons to the tremoloed vocal tones of both Joan Baez and Joni Mitchell. Williams' songwriting is by no means retro, but her soulful singing and deep, cathartic lyrics sometimes traverse into lighthearted and playful (yet cunningly witty) ditties in almost the same style as the aforementioned pair of Singer-Songwriters. Although she is a celebrated folk singer who has consistently played the festival circuit, Williams still unleashes her shimmering soprano vocal stylings in various urban coffeehouses. - Eric Shea

Laura Nyro

Fri, 20 Nov 2009 12:52:05 -0800

Laura Nyro penned reams of tunes for other artists, but she should be remembered for more than just "Stone Soul Picnic" (which the 5th Dimension turned into a huge hit). Like Jimmy Webb, Nyro was one of the definitive songwriting voices of the late 1960s and early '70s, but she also had a successful solo career that was both helped and hampered by a unique, if slightly over-the-top singing style. A real maverick, Nyro created jazz and pop-tinged arrangements containing certain subtleties her impressive voice lacked; meanwhile, her voice and piano came together to continually fudge the line between hope and despair. So while sensitive sorority sisters clung to their copies of Carole King's Tapestry, jaded romantics had Nyro's darkly human New York Tendaberry to help ease the passage from the wide-eyed '60s to the cynical '70s. Nyro's popularity waned in the '80s, but as cancer was claiming her life in the late '90s, her work was rightly being embraced by a new generation of Adult Alternative singer-songwriters. - Nick Dedina

Joan Armatrading

Thu, 26 Nov 2009 11:28:52 -0800

Her British star status has never quite carried over to the US, but Armatrading is one hell of an accomplished songwriter, consistently delivering Caribbean-inflected folk hits with a ringside seat to the inner workings of her romantic soul. As a singer she excels; a periodic, gingerly slip into falsetto will make sure you understand. - Jessy Terry

The Innocence Mission

Sat, 3 Oct 2009 10:44:41 -0700

When the Innocence Mission released their debut record back in '89, they were quickly lumped in with the literate, Mom-friendly work of the 10,000 Maniacs. The stark beauty and isolation conveyed by Karen Peris' vocals in "Wonder of Birds" merited much more than the slight airplay the single received. Her mature, poetic lyrics and the band's fluid acoustic playing were often undermined by the all too crisp production. With each of their four records, the band has managed to become progressively more interesting by stripping away superfluous production elements, drawing full attention to their calm, hazy vocals and simplified instrumentation while garnering mass critical acclaim and minimal public appreciation. - Jon Pruett

Trevor Hall

Mon, 17 Aug 2009 09:14:54 -0700

- Eric Shea

Shawn McDonald

Tue, 18 Aug 2009 15:09:02 -0700

Talk about a complete turnaround! Back in 1999, Shawn McDonald was wanted on nine felony counts of possessing, growing and dealing drugs. "You name the drug and I was selling it and doing it," McDonald says in his bio. "I can't communicate how crazy I was." It was at the lowest point in his life (his second drug bust) that the Oregon-based singer picked up a Bible and challenged God to show him the way. Since then, McDonald strives to find ways to share his story; the most direct way being via his music. In 2003, Sparrow signed the singer-songwriter, releasing his debut, Simply Nothing, the following year. The directness of his songs, and the air of truth imbedded in them, drew people to his music. "The crazy thing I've found is that if you're willing to be really real and honest, people are willing to listen," says McDonald. "So I can tell them about the drug lifestyle I came from and I can tell them about my redemption in Christ." And he does. Willingly. On 2005's Live in Seattle, McDonald shares his life story in between songs and as a context for his lyrics and fans respond with enthusiasm and compassion. The connection between performer and audience is almost tangible. - Linda Ryan

Jackopierce

Fri, 12 Jun 2009 09:56:13 -0700

Jackopierce have everything a talented Folk-Rock act requires, save fame. Apparently the wider public can only handle one such act on their plate at a time, and right now they're still eating Crow -- the Counting Crows, I mean. The songwriting duo of Jack O'Neill and Cary Pierce specializes in bittersweet melodies and sensitive lyrics that you can't help but sing along to. - Chad Driscoll

Teddy Thompson

Fri, 13 Nov 2009 12:39:06 -0800

When your parents are famous folkies Richard and Linda Thompson, your life isn't exactly a normal one. For Teddy Thompson, "normal" meant growing up in a London commune with his family. Gravitating to music early on, Thompson started his first band while in his early teens and by the time he finished school, the 18-year-old was certain music was his calling. To no one's surprise, he packed up and moved to Los Angeles to begin writing songs in earnest. He played shows as often as possible and soon developed a reputation as a singer-songwriter on the rise. A deal with Virgin Records was eventually struck, and Thompson's self-titled debut was released in 2000. The Joe Henry-produced album was an impressive offering and effectively silenced those who doubted Thompson's seemingly effortless ability to impart loneliness in his songs. However, just as swiftly, fate stuck a fat finger in Thompson's eye: all his supporters at the label were let go in a company merger. Dropped from his label and in the doldrums, the musician decided to relocate to New York in order to give his career (as well as himself) a kick in the pants. In 2002, Teddy did the unimaginable and drew his mother Linda out of retirement, after a stress-related speech disorder impaired her ability to sing. Cowriting with his mother and playing on her album turned out to be one of the highlights of Thompson's career thus far, and seemed to inflame his own work. Shortly afterwards, he released an EP and went on tour as a member of Rosanne Cash's band. Keeping busy, but always writing, Thompson eventually caught the attention of Verve Records. His stunning Separate Ways was released to critical acclaim in February 2006. - Linda Ryan

Phil Coulter

Mon, 30 Nov 2009 10:00:40 -0800

One of the biggest selling Irish artists in history, songwriter and pianist Phil Coulter left Ireland to make his name in London during the swinging '60s, writing a number of pop hits and playing with the likes of Van Morrison, the Rolling Stones and Tom Jones. Later he made big bucks writing for the Bay City Rollers; but ultimately he returned to his roots, recording sentimental Irish tunes with lush orchestral arrangements. - Robert Leaver

Tyrone Wells

Fri, 20 Nov 2009 12:52:06 -0800

Iris Dement

Fri, 20 Nov 2009 12:52:07 -0800

Infamous Angel (1992) was an auspicious debut, roundly praised by critics, that fell through the cavernous cracks in the public's appetite for non-commercial country. Songs more honest and moving than "Sweet Forgiveness" and "After You're Gone" are rarely heard: the emotional stingers they leave deep within the listener burn worse as time goes on. It's Dement's gift to convert tiny packages of painful experience into vocal honey so it's easy going down, but these songs pack one heck of an emotional hangover. Dement's no Nashville hothouse flower to whom tick mattresses and gingham dresses are as foreign as distant stars -- she's got the scrappy tough voice and sensibility of a woman who's faced poverty and personal loss and keeps a piece of them within to remind her of where she's been. My Life (1993) and The Way I Should (1996) proved Dement is an artist capable of consistently releasing albums as remarkable as her debut. - Eric Shea

Jay Brannan

Thu, 12 Nov 2009 09:55:05 -0800