bluegrass: Claire Lynch

Love songs, songs of the road, vivid tales from history, stories of family, of change, of choice: you’ll find all of those things in the music of Claire Lynch. Lynch bases her work in bluegrass, and does that so well that she’s received a number of awards in the genre. In that high lonesome sound Lynch finds inspiration rather than limitation, though, branching out from that base to explore aspects of country, Celtic, swing and folk ideas in the songs she chooses and the songs she writes -- and she does that so well that she’s recently been honored with a prestigious United States Artist Fellowship . Before all that recognition, though, her peers knew Lynch was worth paying attention to. Kathy Mattea, Patty Loveless, and The Seldom Scene are among those who have been drawn to record Lynch’s songs. Emmylou Harris, Linda Ronstadt, and Jesse Winchester are among those who’ve asked her to add her voice to their projects.

Take a listen for a moment to the song Kennesaw Line and you’ll readily hear why this is so

Co writer Louisa Branscomb’s three times great aunt saved letters her brothers had written to her during the Civil War, letters which provided the spark for the title track of Lynch’s most recent recording, Dear Sister.. There’s a country blues tinge to the story of loves ups and downs in How Many Moons, and full on bluegrass rules Buttermilk Road/The Arbours. Lynch’s cover of That Kind of Love, written by Pierce Pettis, adds new dimension to an already reflective song. Through the album, Lynch’s clear soprano and thoughtful phrasing are well supported by her regular band mates Mark Schatz on bass, Matt Wingate on guitar and mandolin, and Bryan McDowell on fiddle. Musical guests include Tim O'Brien vocals nd bouzouki and Alison Brown on banjo. It is Claire Lynch’s voice which defines the music on Dear Sister, though.

you may also wish to see
Claire Lynch: Crowd Favorites
Alison Brown: The Company You Keep
Cathie Ryan: Through Wind and Rain

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Top 5 Favorite Music Road Trips

The Great American Road Trip has been winding from the quiet villages of New England to the Blue Ridge in Virginia, from the muddy Mississippi up to the shores of Lake Michigan. Right now, we are in the northern plains of South Dakota. Here are my suggestions for a musical road trip in North Dakota and South Dakota.

It’s also time to take a look back at which of the road trip posts you’re enjoying the most.

Tops on the list, in terms of numbers of you reading, is Road Trip Music: Michigan, in which you learn about Irish American singer and songwriter Cathie Ryan.

You’re also liking the story of the beginning of the road trip idea at Great American Road Trip: Music begins.

The midwest is holding your attention, with
Road Trip Music: Ohio, which features Wilderness Plots, an album about the history of the Ohio Valley from five contemporary songwriters, and Road Trip Music: Indiana, a look at some fine songs from Indiana native Carrie Newcomer.

Road Trip Music in Alabama: bluegrass, faith, and architecture rounds out your top favorites. Claire Lynch and her album Whatcha Gonna Do was a choice for our soundtrack through the wiregrass and red clay hills of Alabam’.


Your choice of Alabama gives me the chance to send out our congratulations to Claire, who was recently named female vocalist of the year by the International Bluegrass Music Association. That’s the top award in bluegrass music. Well done and well deserved Claire!


you may also wish to see
Looking for music from Ireland, Scotland, and Cape Breton? It is here -- check around for articles on The Celtic Colours International Festival, Heidi Talbot’s new album The Last Star, and the debut album from rising Scottish instrumentalist Matheu Watson, and loads of great stuff in our archives. There’s more to come, and more travels on The Great American Road Trip as well. Texas, California, Alaska and all the other states in the American West lie ahead.

and more music from the road trip


This is part of The Great American Road Trip, in which I originally partnered up with A Traveler’s Library to add musical ideas to the book and film suggestions for journeys through the regions of the United States which you’d find there. The Library is closed now, but I think you will still find the journeys through music interesting.

For more about the road trip (and a look at some great road songs) see Great American Road Trip: Music begins

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Road Trip Music pick up for bluegrass awards

As A Traveler’s Library and Music Road have been exploring book, film, and music ideas which inspire journeys through the regions of the United States through the Great American Road Trip, you’ve often heard about books, films, music, authors, and artists with award nominations to their credit. Word comes that it’s time to add another to the list.

The International Bluegrass Music Association Awards are the Grammys of the bluegrass field, top professional recognition of the highest sort. Our good wishes go out to Claire Lynch, whose album Whatcha Gonna Do was our soundtrack for Alabama. She has been nominated for Female Vocalist of the Year. Two songs from that album are up for awards as well. My Florida Sunshine, a lesser known song by bluegrass giant Bill Monroe that Lynch chose for the album, is up for song of the year, and That’s What Makes You Strong, a collaboration Between Ms. Lynch and songwriter Jesse Winchester, is up for recorded event of the year. You’ve met Mr. Winchester along the Great American Road Trip too: he participated in the Kid Pan Alley project called I Used to Know the Names of All the Stars, which was our soundtrack for travels through Virginia.



A full list of IBMA award nominees is here.
The awards will be given out in Nashville on 30 September.

Check out these stops on the road trip to find out more about this music, and join us on Wednesdays as the journey goes on.

Music Road: Road Trip Music in Alabama: bluegrass, faith, & architecture

Music Road: Road Trip Music in Virginia

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Road Trip Music in Alabama: bluegrass, faith, & architecture

Fishing boats on Mobile bay, the home of the Crimson Tide in Tuscaloosa. rocket scientists in Huntsville, farmers in the wiregrass, civil rights history and civil war history: all this is Alabama. The state has a top country group as namesake, as well as a classic rock song. Here is a soundtrack featuring two artists with Alabama in their personal histories, Claire Lynch and Emmylou Harris.




Claire Lynch’s base is in bluegrass -- she’s been nominated for Grammys and won a number of top bluegrass awards for her work -- but it is a solid starting point, not a limit, for her musical taste and imagination. Her most recent recording, Whatcha Gonna Do, makes that point clearly. The range of her art includes traditional bluegrass, progressive bluegrass, a couple of contemporary faith based songs, some swing, and a touch of country. Lynch chooses from all these genres and writes her own material as well. Lynch lived for some years in north Alabama, and among other things wrote a really nice homecoming from the road song called Hills Of Alabam which country star Kathy Mattea recorded some years back. Whatcha Gonna Do makes a fine companion for the winding roads of Alabama, but you won’t go wrong with any of Claire Lynch’s recordings.


The same could be said of Emmylou Harris. Through her career as a pioneer of Americana music and contemporary folk, Harris has been most associated with California and with Nashville. She was born in Birmingham, though, and that deep south background comes through in her work. Her album Red Dirt Girl is anchored in thoughts of Alabama, both in songs she’s written, and songs she’s covered. Another fine Alabama road trip companion from Harris is her often overlooked recording of gospel songs and hymns, Angel Band














While you are thinking about or traveling though Alabama, you may also like to listen to An Architecture of Decency, a podcast from Speaking of Faith. It tells about an innovative project at Auburn University which involves love, compassion, architecture, and rural Alabama. Close to the end of the program, they play a bit of Harris's song Red Dirt Girl, too, quite an inspired connection of narrative and lyric.




photograph of Emmylou Harris on left copyright Kerry Dexter

you may also wish to see
Music Road: Claire Lynch: Crowd Favorites
Music Road: Music Road trip in West Virginia
Emmylou Harris: Quarter Moon in a Ten Cent Town
more music from the road trip


This is part of The Great American Road Trip, in which I originally partnered up with A Traveler’s Library to add musical ideas to the book and film suggestions for journeys through the regions of the United States which you’d find there. The Library is closed now, but I think you will still find the journeys through music interesting.
For more about the road trip (and a look at some great road songs) see Great American Road Trip: Music begins

-->Your support for Music Road is welcome and needed. If you are able to chip in, here is a way to do that, through PayPal. Note that you do not have to have a PayPal account to do this. Thank you.

holiday gift list: American harvest

From the California coastline to the Arizona deserts to the Rockies in Montana, from the Kansas plains to the Texas hill country to the lakes of Minnesota, from the apple orchards of Michigan to the peach trees of South Carolina, from the Gulf Coast to the Maine Coast. the United States is a beautiful and varied country, with people, landscapes, and music to match. Here are several suggestions about music which reveals parts of that, for your holiday gift list, and for gifts to yourself as well.


Albert & Gage Dakota Lullaby

Christine Albert and Chris Gage call Austin, Texas, home these days, and they are fine singers and songwriters, together and separately, so they know a good song when the find one. Recently the pair came across an an old tape made by Tom Peterson, a writer Gage used to know in his native South Dakota, and decided to do a whole album of his work “As we listened to the tape in the truck one night, I felt like we had just struck gold in the Black Hills,” Albert says. Find out what she’s talking about in the haunting past and present of the west in the title track, the funny dash of Louisiana spice If I Die Tomorrow, the affirmation of hope after loss In Tender Loving Care, and the happy swing of Does She Have a Future with Me?

Gretchen Peters One To The Heart, One To The Head

Another take on the American west comes from Gretchen Peters, also a top notch songwriter who decided to lend her gifts to others’songs . Notable tracks include Ian Tyson’s Blue Mountains of Mexico and Stephanie Davis’s Wolves, and an original instrumental by Barry Walsh, North Platte. Tom Russell sits in too.


Tim Grimm, Michael White, Krista Detor, Tom Roznowski, Carrie Newcomer
Wilderness Plots
These five artists look at a different sort of frontier, building their songs around a time where the Ohio Valley, where they all live, was just beyond the edge of civilization. There are songs of hardships, imagination, joy, sorrow, distances, and choices, all framed in the stories that time and place, set in time yet timeless. .

Claire Lynch Whatcha Gonna Do

Claire Lynch’s music is rooted in bluegrass, a bluegrass that lends itself to crossing borders into swing, country, and folk without ever losing its bedrock authenticity. Lynch, who has won a number of awards and been nominated for a Grammy, has a warm, engaging soprano, and she chooses songs of substance that often include a dash of humor, and are just as likely to include a dash of faith. A train song, a song about false lovers, a meditation on love’s hardships and the strength it takes to learn from them, and really fine road song are just a few of the gems she shares here,. accompanied most of the time by her road band, and with a guest shot from Jesse Winchester.

Steve Wariner c.g.p. My Tribute to Chet Atkins

If you’re looking for excellent guitar work on tunes you may know and others you won’t have heard before, then this is the recording for you. You get some history along the way, too: Atkins was a legendary Nashville guitarist and producer who worked with artists ranging from The Carter Family to Mark O’Connor, to a young guy from Indian, Steve Wariner, who became a close friend ( and certified guitar player -- thats’ what the c.g.p stands for). Wariner decide to frame this tribute to his friend, who died several years ago, as a sort of chronology of Atkins’s life, with some original pieces to mark certain times and places mixed in with music Atkins played, composed, and produced. The result is a flowing set of music that’ll keep you engaged and interested through many listenings, . If you’ve a guitar player on you holiday list, be sure to consider this one..



you may also want to see

Music Road: holiday gift list: music of Canada

Music Road: holiday gift list: Irish music

Music Road: Robin & Linda Williams: The First Christmas Gift

if you are looking for non musical gifts
here's a roundup with ideas for pet lovers, readers, travelers. lovers of Hawaii. Martha Stewart fans...and the list goes on

Work of autumn: music

The angle of light has been turning toward autumn where I am in recent days. The shadows in evening are long, the rim of light around the leaves and the people walking down the road has a golden cast, and every so often there’s a cool edge to the breeze. Mist hangs longer over the lake as the natural world gathers in for harvest time. Autumn is traditionally a time of harvest. It also marks a time of change, from the flourishing of summer to bringing that growth in and sorting it to savor. It’s a time of building bridges, too, between the open spaces of summer and the quiet, interior reflection which winter often brings. A lovely season, with many changes within itself, from these first bright days through rain and wind and gorgeous turning leaves to grey days and the peace and questions found along the paths of autumn. Here are three fine musical companions for these journeys: The Return Journey is the latest solo album from guitarist and composer Bill Cooley. His Irish music loving side comes to the front on Gang Forward, and Morning Poem is a reflective solo guitar piece perfect for these autumn days. The whole album is, actually. The music contains references to folk, jazz, country, and bluegrass. Claire Lynch just keeps on getting better and better. Through the music on her latest release, Whatcha Gonna Do, Lynch walks in the light and shadow of life with grace and thoughtfulness and dashes of humor - and she’s a singer with a lovely soprano who really knows how to serve whatever song she’s singing, be that based in bluegrass or swing, folk or country. She’s also building her skills as a writer. Two of my favorite songs here are Highway, which Lynch wrote with Irene Kelley, and Face to Face, which she wrote with Donna Ulisse. Every song on the record is a keeper, though. There is light and shadow on Matt and Shannon Heaton’s recording Lovers' Well, too. They’ve looked into Irish tradition -- and a bit further -- for songs and tunes which invite listeners to consider the kaleidoscope of emotion that two people bring with them and go through as they learn to love each other. There are lovers parted, lovers just finding each other, lovers reunited and lovers' questions. Songs and tunes alike unfold these stories in music that makes a fine companion for the season of change and turning leaves. you may also want to see Music Road: now playing: Kathy Mattea: Coal you’ll find Bill Cooley’s work on this fine record, too Music Road: season of change: music for autumn autumn music: harvest home, crossing bridges

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Claire Lynch: Crowd Favorites

Crowd Favorites
It takes only the first phrase or two of Train Long Gone, the opening cut on Crowd Favorites, for Claire Lynch to let you know she’s a singer with stories to tell and the heart and intelligence to keep you listening. She’s grounded in bluegrass -- indeed the second track, The Day That Lester Died, is a musician’s tribute to another musician, Lester Flatt. Lynch uses the bluegrass tradition to add spice and flavor to that bluesy opening track, to Harry Hipkins’ swing tune, Fallin’ in Love, and to the Cajun romp Thibodaux. Along the way there’s the restless soul with ‘the faith of a saint but the soul of a gambler’ in Gretchen Peters' song If Wishes Were Horses, the punch of the lyrics backed with spot on high speed picking, there’s the reflective woman talking with her God in Your Presence is My Favorite Gift, the road weary musicians finding hope along the way in Hills of Alabam, a pair of Civil War soldiers in a vivid vignette on life, death, and a hot summer’s day on Kennesaw Line, and the mother reflecting on the future of her son in Friends for a Lifetime.

With all that (and there’s more) it’s no wonder that Patty Loveless, John Starling, Emmylou Harris, Linda Ronstadt, and Kathy Mattea are among those who’ve recorded Lynch’s songs and invited her to sing on their records. She’s been honored with bluegrass association awards and Grammy nominations as well.

This collection offers a few old favorites from Lynch’s early days with the Front Porch String band, newly recorded -- The Day That Lester Died and Kennesaw Line are two of those -- and a selection of what really are crowd favorites, ones that Lynch’s fans have most often asked to hear her sing. From the quiet and unexpected He Don’t Like to Talk About It to that fast ride on Train Long Gone to another train trip back through tradition on Wabash Cannonball, Claire Lynch offers a collection that shows her to be not only one of the best singers going in bluegrass today, but also a musician with a taste for songs and stories that last.

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