Tag: Mary Gauthier

BGS 5+5: Jaimee Harris

Posted on by Editor

Artist: Jaimee Harris
Hometown: Hewitt, Texas
Latest Album: Boomerang Town (out February 17, 2023)

Which artist has influenced you the most … and how?

Emmylou Harris. I got my first guitar on Christmas Day. That holiday season, every moment I wasn’t at school or at church I was sitting by the stereo putting “Light of the Stable” on repeat. I was mesmerized by Emmylou’s voice, the production, the melody, and the harmonies. I learned later in life the backing vocals are Dolly Parton, Neil Young, and Linda Ronstadt. Not only have I been tremendously influenced by Emmylou’s voice as a lead singer and a harmony singer, but also by the songs she cut. They opened me up to songwriters who laid out the road map of my own songwriting journey.

What has been the best advice you’ve received in your career so far?

It’s a tie for these two golden bits of wisdom that have been passed down to me by my partner, Mary Gauthier, who is much farther along in her career than I am.

1. Do not sign anything unless they’re writing you a check.
2. Don’t take the Ambien until the plane takes off. (I think this one came from Ralph Murphy)

What’s your favorite memory from being on stage?

The most powerful experience I’ve had sharing my music wasn’t on stage. It was sharing my songs in a circle at an incredible place in Tulsa called Women in Recovery. WIR is an alternative to prison for women facing convictions for non-violent crimes related to substance abuse. Oklahoma incarcerates more women per capita than any state in the country and this place is trying change that brutal statistic by offering twelve step recovery meetings, educational resources, therapeutic resources, and housing solutions. I had no idea that a song I wrote in early sobriety, “Snow White Knuckles,” would go out into the world and be of service in such a powerful way. It’s opened doors for me to play in prisons and recovery centers all over the world. That song has a power so far beyond me. I’m deeply grateful to continue to have the opportunity to share it and follow it into spaces where it can be of service.

Since food and music go so well together, what is your dream pairing of a meal and a musician?

I’m a huge fan of Michael Fracasso. In addition to being a tremendously gifted songwriter, Fracasso is a fabulous chef. I’ve been extremely fortunate to receive a return invitation to a holiday party in Austin where tons of great songwriters (like my friend Darden Smith) and musicians (David Pulkingham is always a highlight for me) come together to swap songs campfire-style. Michael always puts together a beautiful meal for everyone and sings with us. It’s extraordinary.

How often do you hide behind a character in a song or use “you” when it’s actually “me”?

After being a songwriter for 13 years, I went to my very first songwriting workshop in 2017. I couldn’t possibly recommend it more. I wish I’d done it sooner! It helped me to consciously access methods I’d previously been using subconsciously and taught me a lot about where to laser beam my focus in the editing/rewriting process. I co-teach with my partner, Mary Gauthier, often now. This topic comes up often. When we’re working with a student’s song, Gauthier points out that when a listener hears “I” in a song, they’re not thinking about the voice delivering the song. They’re thinking about themselves. I believe this is one of the most powerful tools of songwriting – singing “I,” brings the listener into the experience of the narrator, which creates an opening for empathy to glide through.

Photo Credit: Brandon Aguilar

The Show On The Road – Mary Gauthier

Posted on by Shelby Williamson

This week, the show dials into the Nashville studio of one of the most gifted songwriters and empathic storytellers of her generation: Mary Gauthier. While Mary has become known for her darkly honest tales of overcoming addiction and seeking truth and joy after overcoming her troubled upbringing in Louisiana, she was nominated for a Grammy for her devastating record Rifles & Rosary Beads (co-written with U.S. veterans and their loved-ones), and her new record may be her most surprising and moving collection yet.

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Dark Enough to See the Stars, which drops June 3 on Thirty Tigers, is in many ways an unabashed romance album — celebrating, in her own sardonic John Prine-meets-Anthony Bourdain style, how lovely it can be to find true love and creative joy at long last.

During the pandemic she began performing a weekly stream called Sundays With Mary with her amor — the talented songwriter Jaimee Harris — and while Gauthier has now returned to the road, the cathartic weekly song sharing show has continued, too. Harris helped write the swoon-worthy traveling song “Amsterdam” on the newest LP.

Gauthier’s road to stability and creative contentment was a long one. As she gamely explains in this intense conversation, she made the leap to leave the relentless life of being a cook and restaurant owner (and partaker in too many illegal substances) and devoted herself to songwriting after getting arrested at thirty. Was she an instant hit on folk stages in her then base of Boston? Not exactly. In fact, she couldn’t step on any stage without shaking. But she kept at it and the stories flowed. Early tours with Prine gave her confidence. Her breakout record Mercy Now (2005) chronicles her technicolor debauched early years with the clear-eyed grace of the newly sober, trying to give forgiveness to her troubled family and to herself for making it through. Being an openly gay songwriter, she took early inspiration from her heroes the Indigo Girls who showed her there was a place for a new kind of empowered songwriting — not just for women, but for anyone who wanted to look deeper into what women are experiencing behind closed doors.

If Gauthier has one superpower as a songwriter it’s her ability to empathize with everyone around her — even the troubled soldiers who she teamed up with on Rifles & Rosary Beads. We have way more in common with each other than many may think, and overcoming trauma is pretty damn universal. Her book Saved by a Song: The Art and Healing Power of Songwriting is her most powerful collection of stories, and may explain best how her art has evolved in the last two decades, plus on the road.

Photo Credit: Alexa King Stone

LISTEN: Mary Gauthier, “Dark Enough to See the Stars”

Posted on by Editor

Artist: Mary Gauthier
Hometown: Nashville, Tennessee
Song: “Dark Enough to See the Stars”
Album: Dark Enough to See the Stars
Release Date: June 3, 2022
Label: Thirty Tigers

In Their Words: “I co-wrote the song ‘Dark Enough to See the Stars’ with Beth Nielsen Chapman many years ago, but never released it because it did not feel quite right. We took another look at it during the dark days of the pandemic after we’d both lost several dear friends. We saw the song in a new light and were able to rewrite it and find the core idea… which is that although the people that we’d lost were gone, the love that they’d given us was not. It was given as a gift we could keep, forever. There is something about grief that brings clarity. I took the title from a Martin Luther King Jr. speech. Dr. King said, ‘Trouble is in the land; confusion all around. But I know, somehow, that only when it is dark enough can you see the stars.’ To me, this means when things seem at their worst, we’re often gifted with knowing exactly what is important, and what matters most.” — Mary Gauthier

Photo Credit: Alexa King

BGS 5+5: Anya Hinkle

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Artist: Anya Hinkle
Hometown: Asheville, North Carolina
Latest album: Eden and Her Borderland
Personal nicknames (or rejected band names): Anyabird

Which artist has influenced you the most … and how?

I guess far and away I have to answer — Gillian Welch. I grew up in the New River Valley of Virginia listening to Tony Rice, Norman Blake, Taj Mahal, Hot Tuna, Muddy Waters, Grateful Dead, and Old and in the Way, loved bluegrass and blues, but also female folk singers like Joan Baez and Judy Collins, pop stars like Madonna and Cyndi Lauper, and songwriters like Sarah McLachlan, Natalie Merchant, and Suzanne Vega. It just took Gillian to come around with her Revival album and put all that together for me, that you could incorporate all those great roots sounds into something completely modern and original. I was living in California at the time I heard her first album. I grabbed my fiddle and headed straight down to 5th String Music in Berkeley and started going to every bluegrass jam I could find. I thank her for giving me the idea that I could do it too — because of her genius, I could begin to imagine myself singing and playing guitar and writing songs too. It’s important to have someone you can look up to and that you can relate to so you can even have the idea in the first place.

What’s the toughest time you ever had writing a song?

For more than a dozen years now, I’ve been hanging around the Cumberlands with my buddy “Hippie” Jack Stoddart, someone who, in his rough and audacious way, brings people together to make a lot of magic. Hippie said to me one day, “I want to introduce you to Zona.” He’d been doing a lot of outreach work out of an old school bus bringing groceries and coats and toys and stuff to people living in former mining towns in Middle Tennessee. So he brought me up the mountain to meet the hardened sweetness that is Zona Abston. We sat around her kitchen table and she told me her life story, a miner’s daughter, growing up with little education and no money, not much luck or hope. When we collapsed back in the truck, Hippie said to me, “You better write this shit down!” And so I did. I wrote every detail: the cancer, the hunger, the cheating, the shining, the debt, the babies, the heartbreak. I came back with a mess of notes and thought, “How do I make a song out of this?” So I sat down and tried to pull out the most specific and moving details of everything she told me and created a ballad for her. I was super nervous to play it for her because, well it was HER life. SHE had to live it. But when I sang it for her the tears rolled down her beautiful face. She said, yup it’s all true, every word of it.

If you had to write a mission statement for your career, what would it be?

I actually thought about this a lot earlier this year, during the pandemic when I was trying to understand what my purpose was in music when it seemed like the industry was going to hell. I decided to focus on three things, and wrote them on a yellow sticky note that is taped in front of my desk for quick reference. The first is authenticity, and a commitment to truth and honesty to who I am as an artist. It’s a challenge to believe that it’s all already inside. I don’t need to grasp at something outside of myself. I just need to continue to learn to trust myself and be myself. The second thing is connection — connection with other artists and musicians, connections with my fans and supporters, and connections with anyone along the path. Those beautiful relationships are the foundation for anything I can possibly hope to accomplish in this lifetime. Saying “yes” and valuing the people that show up for me is oxygen. The third thing is creativity — growth and discovery. Allowing myself to surrender to the journey, giving up thinking I have to have everything figured out and under control. I need to just submit to curiosity, openness, and faith.

Which elements of nature do you spend the most time with and how do those impact your work?

Before I was a musician I was trained as an ethnobotanist. I traveled half the world studying plants and their uses and connections to culture. I love referring specifically to plant species in my songs because they can be so symbolic in our physical world. For example, in the the title track for my new record, Eden and Her Borderlands, I use a couple of plants that carry a deeper meaning. The cedar is fragrant and twisted, it’s green the year round, its oils are used to protect against decay and disease, it is sacred and ancient in its symbolism. I also use the sycamore. It is stately and grand, always grows near sweet water. It is often a boundary and its presence on the landscape signals a threshold that we approach and then cross over. Adding these botanical details to the song is like adding spices to a recipe, it gives more depth, even for those that might not know anything about botany. And who knows, maybe it will inspire people to love plants like I do!

How often do you hide behind a character in a song or use “you” when it’s actually “me”?

I love this question because initially there can be so much fear in exposing your true self. Absolutely mortifying to lay bare the thoughts and emotions of a real human, the one behind the Facebook posts and the stage persona and the person you think you are or wish you were. The real one with all the real flaws, that is the person that is actually interesting. But the songs really push yourself (myself!!!) to look in the mirror and substitute the “you” with “me,” to get personal. Well, it’s a journey of acceptance and insight. Getting personal is the thing that connects us to the rest of humanity and, honestly, the thing that makes a good song, the thing that makes a song relatable.

I recently took a songwriting course with Mary Gauthier. In the song I shared, I kept referring to myself as “babe.” She said, who is babe? She focuses a lot on pronouns, you know, who are we talking about here? Because in our heads, it’s always about us. It can’t NOT be. We are trying to figure out what the hell we are doing here and if we are at all worthy of anything we are pretending to do. It takes a lot of working through fear to write songs. It’s good work.

Photo credit: Sandlin Gaither

16 Summer Reads: New Books by Brandi Carlile, Mary Gauthier, and More

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My summer essentials list is pretty simple: A ball cap and sunscreen for a hike, driving directions and a trail map for a day trip, and more than a few reading options for the couch that’s inevitably waiting for me at the end of a long hot summer day. Gathering together all the new memoirs and taking some tips from my BGS colleagues, here are 16 top tomes to get us all — even the kids — through this sweltering season of 2021.

Rob Bowman, The Last Soul Company: The Malaco Records Story

Generous in its photography and its scope, this overview of Malaco Records explains how a pioneering independent label founded in 1962 brought a wealth of African American music to the world via artists like Mississippi Fred McDowell, Bobby Blue Bland, Z.Z. Hill, Johnnie Taylor, Little Milton, and James Cleveland.

Brandi Carlile, Broken Horses

This memoir satisfies the longtime fans who will learn what inspired the songs from her early albums, yet it’s also a candid and conversational statement about what it’s like to be a queer woman in roots music today. The cast of characters is charming, too, particularly her exchanges with Elton John and Joni Mitchell.

Brent Cobb, Little Stuff

Country tunesmith Brent Cobb has said he writes every album with his kids in mind, so transforming the song “Little Stuff” into a children’s book came naturally. But how many children’s books get their own music video? Whether you read it or watch it, the Georgia musician’s homespun wisdom shines through.

Robert Owen Gardner, The Portable Community: Place and Displacement in Bluegrass Festival Life

This scholarly look at bluegrass festival culture in the American West comes from sociology professor Robert Owen Gardner. It’s also an examination of how arts and music grapple with social and environmental change. A digital version of the academic textbook allows more room in the backpack for sunscreen and guitar strings.

Mary Gauthier, Saved by a Song: The Art and Healing Power of Songwriting

More of a memoir than an instruction manual, Mary Gauthier tells the stories behind original songs like “Mercy Now” while leaving the mystical and magical aura of writing them intact. By sharing her intimate conversations and co-writing experiences, she offers both a creative and compassionate point of view.

Howard Grimes with Preston Lauterbach, Timekeeper

Known as Bulldog, Memphis drummer Howard Grimes has propelled R&B classics like Al Green’s “Let’s Stay Together” and Ann Peebles’ “I Can’t Stand the Rain.” In this autobiography, he also explains how he wound up homeless for a time and how he’s been guided by the Bible. Fans of Stax and Hi Records won’t want to miss this one.

Chris Hillman, Time Between: My Life as a Byrd, Burrito Brother, and Beyond

You can’t tell the story of country rock without Chris Hillman. Time Between entered its second printing earlier this year, proving there’s still a curiosity about near-mythical bands like The Byrds and the Flying Burrito Brothers. Start at page one and turn, turn, turn to the get the whole story from this prolific Rock and Roll Hall of Famer.

Johnnyswim, Home Sweet Road: Finding Love, Making Music & Building a Life One City at a Time.

The ever-endearing Johnnyswim found an even larger following when Chip and Joanna Gaines chose the duo’s anthem “Home” as the theme to Fixer Upper. Now, Amanda Sudano-Ramirez and Abner Ramirez give fans a deep dive into their own family life with Home Sweet Road, their debut book brimming with photos, recipes, stories, and poetry.

Kimberly Mack, Fictional Blues: Narrative Self-Invention from Bessie Smith to Jack White

The story of Robert Johnson selling his soul to the devil isn’t the only larger-than-life narrative in blues music. A scholar of African American literature and American popular music at The University of Toledo, Mack writes about how similar self-made personas resist racial, social, economic and gendered oppression.

Richard Marx, Stories to Tell: A Memoir

A late ’80s pop star whose catalog still holds up, Marx writes about his life and career, including a few interactions with era-defining figures like Olivia Newton-John and Kenny Rogers. He also gives his candid perspective of what the music industry is really like. By the way, can’t you totally hear Alison Krauss covering “Right Here Waiting“?

Willie Nelson with Turk Pipkin, Willie Nelson’s Letters to America

At 88 years old, Willie Nelson is a living legend with a modern point of view. Yet, rather than ranting on social media, he’s channeled his thoughts into a series of letters, even writing one to Texas and another to marijuana. With his classic lyrics reprinted alongside these letters, the book captures his conversational charisma.

Sinéad O’Connor, Rememberings

This Irish artist made an iconic music video by tearfully emoting into the lens, but there is much more to her story than “Nothing Compares 2U” and her infamous appearance on SNL. As The Guardian notes, “O’Connor also doesn’t need a ghost writer because she has, throughout all of it, rarely been at a loss for what to say.”

Sarit Packer and Itamar Srulovlich, Honey & Co: Chasing Smoke: Cooking Over Fire Around the Levant

In this cookbook and travelogue, the founders of London restaurant Honey & Co. are seeking out savory smoke flavors in Egypt, Jordan, Israel, Turkey, and Greece. And it’s not just grilled meat! Fruits, vegetables, breads and “Unmissables” are make their way into these pages, too. Find out more about the authors on BGS’s The Shift List.

Kim Ruehl, A Singing Army: Zilphia Horton and the Highlander Folk School

An activist and song collector, Zilphia Horton finally gets her due. Ruehl (also a BGS contributor) explains how Horton adapted folk music and hymns for empowerment and social causes, with “We Shall Overcome” as just one example. Considering the school’s ties to civil rights, this piece of Tennessee history merits the attention.

Bobby Rush with Herb Powell, I Ain’t Studdin’ Ya: My American Blues Story

A favorite on the blues scene since the 1950s, Bobby Rush remains a beloved figure in the genre, winning his second Grammy for Best Traditional Blues Album earlier this year. A well-traveled entertainer at age 87, this memoir follows his remarkable life journey from Louisiana to Arkansas, on to Chicago and ultimately the Blues Hall of Fame.

Paul Simon, The 59th Street Bridge Song (Feelin’ Groovy): A Children’s Picture Book

If you gotta make the morning last with little ones around, try this imaginative picture book. With song lyrics from the 1966 Simon & Garfunkel classic and vivid illustrations by Keith Henry Brown, the 24-page book captures the small details of city life by following a bunny on a bicycle — how groovy is that?

 

BGS 5+5: Zach Schmidt

Posted on by Editor

Artist: Zach Schmidt
Hometown: Nashville, Tennessee
Latest Album: Raise a Banner
Personal nicknames (or rejected band names): Schmidty is kind of a birthright when your last name is Schmidt, you are going to be called it whether you like it or not.

Which artist has influenced you the most … and how?

If I have to pick just one, without a doubt I would say Guy Clark. I have loved his music as long as I can remember. Sometimes I feel like it has always been a part of me. Every time I listen to him I hear something I have never heard before. The songs tend to evolve over time for me. Over the years I have studied his words in written form, learned his songs, and listened countless times. I don’t think I could ever get tired of listening to Guy Clark and his music has absolutely changed my world in a dramatic way.

What other art forms — literature, film, dance, painting, etc. — inform your music?

I try to draw inspiration from everything that I encounter but literature and film certainly inspire my writing in a significant way. The song “I Can’t Dance” from this album was written right after I saw the movie Manchester by the Sea. I won’t try and spoil it for people who have not seen it, but the house fire scene absolutely wrecked me when I saw it. Facing loss and working through it is something we all can relate to, especially after a year like 2020 and the way that movie portrayed the protagonist was so beautifully heartbreaking.

What’s the toughest time you ever had writing a song?

I think when I try to co-write with someone I don’t know very well. That is something I didn’t know anything about when I moved to Nashville and something I reluctantly tried. Trying to force out a song for the sake of time or a sense of accomplishment is brutal. These days I don’t mind writing with friends but I always need some time to work into my own creative flow.

Which elements of nature do you spend the most time with and how do those impact your work?

I will make any excuse to spend some alone time with Mother Earth. Being alone out in the woods is one of the best ways to clear your head. I love to hike and mountain bike any chance that I can. I also find myself digging through the trash and recycling a fair amount to sort what belongs where. We have to take good care of this place.

Since food and music go so well together, what is your dream pairing of a meal and a musician?

Since I was talking about Guy Clark earlier I will stay with him. As he says in “Lone Star Hotel”: “Give me greasy enchiladas and a beer to wash it down.”

Photo credit: Curtis Wayne Millard

Harmonics with Beth Behrs: Beth Behrs & the Brothers Koren, ‘The Moon Will Stay’

Posted on by Shelby Williamson

Beth Behrs, host of the BGS podcast Harmonics, is premiering her new album with the Brothers Koren, The Moon Will Stay – now available on Bandcamp.


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The project was originally intended to be purely therapeutic, a merging of Behrs’ personal poetry and the Korens’ music it inspired. But over time, with the growth of the Harmonics community and a decision to be more vulnerable with her listeners, Behrs decided to release the album via Bandcamp, donating the proceeds to three organizations near and dear to her heart:

Songwriting with Soldiers provides weekend retreats across the U.S. for veterans who have served in all conflicts. Since 2012, they’ve connected with hundreds of veterans and military families, and created a safe and inspiring environment to share their experiences and write with professional songwriters, like Mary Gauthier, a guest on Season 1 of Harmonics.

Jewel’s Never Broken program, in partnership with the Inspiring Children Foundation, aides struggling children through mental health support, mentoring, education, and equip them with life skills and tools to earn college scholarships. Jewel will be the first guest on Season 2 of Harmonics, premiering next week.

The Equus Foundation is the only national animal welfare foundation in the U.S. that is 100% dedicated to protecting the country’s horses, and strengthening the bond between horses and people. Their mission is to safeguard the dignity of America’s horses throughout their lives, and to share the ability that horses have to empower, teach, and heal. Equine therapy has had a huge impact on host Beth Behrs’ and her family’s lives — horses have been instrumental in her mental health and loving connection within her family.

Subscribe to Harmonics to stay in the loop for Season 2, premiering on Tuesday, March 9, featuring guests like singer-songwriter Jewel, legendary comedian and entertainer Carol Burnett, renowned singer and actress Kristin Chenoweth, and so many more incredible guests!

Follow @harmonicspodcast on Instagram for more updates on these incredible organizations, and to stay updated on the podcast.

Album Art: Hana Behrs

Harmonics with Beth Behrs: Episode 7, Mary Gauthier

Posted on by Shelby Williamson

Singer, songwriter, activist, and all-around badass Mary Gauthier joins host Beth Behrs on this episode of Harmonics. The two talk about why superheroes are so often adoptees and orphans (and vice versa), the power of songwriting for veterans of the armed forces, her last live show immediately before the shutdown, and so much more.


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Mary Gauthier’s name is spoken with reverence in songwriter circles. She’s won countless awards from organizations like the Americana Music Association, GLAAD, and Folk Alliance International, and was nominated for Best Folk Album at the 2019 Grammy Awards.

A Louisiana native, Gauthier has been releasing her own music for over twenty years, but her 2019 record Rifles & Rosary Beads brought a whole new level to her art, when she collaborated with the Songwriting With Soldiers project to put wounded veterans’ stories to song. 

 

‘Harmonics with Beth Behrs’ Debuts on BGS Podcast Network on September 8

Posted on by Editor

The Bluegrass Situation is thrilled to announce the newest addition to the BGS Podcast Network: Harmonics With Beth Behrs. The eight-episode podcast explores the intersections of music, creativity, wellness, and healing. (Subscribe here.)

Hosted and produced by actress, comedian, and banjo lover Beth Behrs (The Neighborhood, 2 Broke Girls) each episode features a deep dive conversation into topics such as mental health, sound healing, songwriting as therapy, ancient musical traditions, and the power of the creative process on our physical bodies and emotional selves.

The first two episodes of the series premiere on Tuesday, September 8, kicking off with guests Glennon Doyle (New York Times bestselling author of Untamed) and renowned sound healer Geeta Novotny. Other featured season one guests include Brandi Carlile, Mary Gauthier, Mickey Guyton, Tichina Arnold, and Allison Russell.

Behrs says, “Songs are simple ways of telling stories, you can find a song to fit any mood you’re in. That’s because music bypasses the intellect and goes straight to the heart. I’ve always felt that healing is creative and creativity is healing. Maybe it’s magic? I want to feel closer to the magic. I want all of you to feel closer to the magic. Harmonics was born so we could explore the intersection between music, healing, creativity, and spirituality- and in doing so, makes ourselves feel a part of something bigger. Less alone. More connected.”

Amy Reitnouer Jacobs, co-founder and executive director of BGS, says, “Developing this show with Beth was a dream — we’ve wanted to do something together for a long time. During this time when we’re all refocusing our lives and constantly assessing the state of the world, creating a space where women could be honest and vulnerable about so many topics — such as maintaining creative processes under stress and maintaining mental and physical health at home — seemed more relevant and necessary than ever before. We’re honored to feature so many incredible talents from the roots music world, but I think the breadth of our guests will show our audience that so many of these themes are universal and relevant across the creative spectrum.”

 

The String – Producers Rick Clark and Neilson Hubbard

Posted on by Chris Jacobs

Recording producers are often the best people to speak with to gain extra insight into what makes some music more effective than others. And that’s what we do this episode with two Nashville leaders with very different stories.


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Rick Clark came of age in Memphis and moved to Nashville in the 90s. He’s been a DJ, a compilation curator and a music supervisor for film and TV. He’s also getting back into songwriting and recording his own music. Neilson Hubbard is a key player in the modern Nashville music scene, with albums to his credit by Mary Gauthier, Gretchen Peters, Nora Jane Struthers and Matthew Perryman Jones. His own band of late is called the Orphan Brigade.