Adam Stemple

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Adam Stemple
Adam Stemple performing April 2015.jpg
Stemple at Cats Laughing reunion concert, April 2015
Background information
Genres Folk rock, Celtic music
Occupation(s)Musician, writer
InstrumentsGuitar, vocals
Years active1988–present
Website www.adamstemple.com

Adam Stemple is a Celtic-influenced American folk rock musician, based in Minneapolis, Minnesota. He is also the author of several fantasy short stories and novels, including two series of novels co-written with his mother, writer Jane Yolen.

Contents

Stemple also wrote a Push-Fold chart for poker with poker player Chris Wallace. [1]

Music

Stemple played guitar and sang as a member of the folk rock "rock-and-reel" band Cats Laughing from 1988 to 1996. [2] The band also included notable fantasy/science fiction authors Steven Brust and Emma Bull.

For twelve years, he was lead singer/guitarist for the band Boiled in Lead. [3] Stemple first appeared on Boiled in Lead's 1994 album Antler Dance . [4] He co-wrote nine songs with science fiction and fantasy author Steven Brust on the 1995 album Songs from The Gypsy , released as an enhanced CD. The CD has the distinction of including the full text of the novel The Gypsy , which Brust co-authored with Megan Lindholm and upon which the songs were based. [5]

Stemple also produced and performed on Steven Brust's solo album A Rose for Iconoclastes . [6]

Stemple currently is with the Tim Malloys, an Irish band. Like Cats Laughing and Boiled in Lead, Stemple's current group shares musical roots that incorporate Celtic and rock styles.

In April 2015, Stemple reunited with Cats Laughing in a concert at the Minicon science fiction convention. A live CD and DVD of the concert was released in late 2015.

Fiction

Stemple's first novel, for Tor Books, was Singer of Souls. [7] A sequel, Steward of Song, was published in 2008.

With his mother, Jane Yolen, Stemple has also co-authored two series of books — the Rock 'n Roll Fairy Tale series, and more recently, The Seelie Wars. The Rock 'n Roll Fairy Tale series began with Pay the Piper, published in 2005 by Tor. [8] Pay the Piper was the winner of the 2006 Locus Award for Best Young Adult Book. [9]

Stemple's short stories include a series of historical whodunnits set in feudal Japan, featuring a samurai master and apprentice as a sleuthing duo, for the historical fiction magazine Paradox .

Among Stemple's other published short stories, "A Piece of Flesh" was chosen as one of ten short stories included in The Year's Best SF and Fantasy for Teens (2005). [10]

Stemple was among the members of a group of writers known as the Pre-Joycean Fellowship, which included his bandmates Emma Bull and Steven Brust.

Discography

with Cats Laughing:

with Boiled in Lead:

Bibliography

Novels

Selected short fiction

Related Research Articles

Steven Brust American fantasy and science fiction author

Steven Karl Zoltán Brust is an American fantasy and science fiction author of Hungarian descent. He is best known for his series of novels about the assassin Vlad Taltos, one of a disdained minority group of humans living on a world called Dragaera. His recent novels also include The Incrementalists (2013) and its sequel The Skill of Our Hands (2017), with co-author Skyler White.

Robin Hobb American fiction writer (pseudonym)

Margaret Astrid Lindholm Ogden, better known by her pen names Robin Hobb and Megan Lindholm, is an American writer. Her work spans the speculative fiction genre, ranging from secondary-world fantasy as Hobb, to urban fantasy and science fiction as Lindholm. She is best known for her fantasy novels set in the Realm of the Elderlings, for which The Times described Hobb as "one of the great modern fantasy writers". Her Farseer, Liveship Traders and Tawny Man trilogies have sold more than a million copies.

Emma Bull American novelist

Emma Bull is an American science fiction and fantasy author. Her novels include the Hugo- and Nebula-nominated Bone Dance and the urban fantasy War for the Oaks. She is also known for a series of anthologies set in Liavek, a shared universe that she created with her husband, Will Shetterly. As a singer, songwriter, and guitarist, she has been a member of the Minneapolis-based folk/rock bands Cats Laughing and The Flash Girls.

Jane Yolen American writer of fantasy, science fiction, and childrens books (born 1939)

Jane Hyatt Yolen is an American writer of fantasy, science fiction, and children's books. She is the author or editor of more than 350 books, of which the best known is The Devil's Arithmetic, a Holocaust novella. Her other works include the Nebula Award−winning short story "Sister Emily's Lightship", the novelette "Lost Girls", Owl Moon, The Emperor and the Kite, the Commander Toad series and How Do Dinosaurs Say Goodnight. She has collaborated on works with all three of her children, most extensively with Adam Stemple.

Teresa Nielsen Hayden American editor and writer

Teresa Nielsen Hayden is an American science fiction editor, fanzine writer, essayist, and workshop instructor. She is a consulting editor for Tor Books and is well known for her weblog, Making Light. She has also worked for Federated Media Publishing, when in 2007 she was hired to revive the comment section for the blog Boing Boing. Nielsen Hayden has been nominated for Hugo Awards five times.

<i>War for the Oaks</i> 1987 fantasy novel by Emma Bull

War for the Oaks (1987) is a fantasy novel by American writer Emma Bull. The book tells the story of Eddi McCandry, a rock musician who finds herself unwillingly pulled into the supernatural faerie conflict between good and evil. War for the Oaks is one of the first works in the subgenre of urban fantasy: although it involves supernatural characters, the setting (Minneapolis) is decidedly real-world.

The Pre-Joycean Fellowship, abbreviated PJF, is a collective identification that was semi-seriously adopted by several writers known for fantasy and science fiction, to indicate that they value 19th-century values of storytelling. An example of such values is clarity, which was called by Jane Yolen the "lovely limpid quality" of writing.

Terri Windling American writer and editor

Terri Windling is an American editor, artist, essayist, and the author of books for both children and adults. She has won nine World Fantasy Awards, the Mythopoeic Fantasy Award, and the Bram Stoker Award, and her collection The Armless Maiden appeared on the short-list for the James Tiptree, Jr. Award.

Will Shetterly American fantasy and science fiction author

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Liavek is a series of five fantasy anthologies edited by Emma Bull and Will Shetterly set in a shared world.

Cats Laughing Folk rock band from Minneapolis

Cats Laughing is a folk rock band, founded in the late 1980s in Minneapolis, Minnesota, and revived in 2015. Several of its members, including Emma Bull and best-selling author Steven Brust, are better known as writers of fantasy and science fiction.

<i>The Gypsy</i> (novel) 1992 fantasy novel by Steven Brust and Megan Lindholm

The Gypsy is a 1992 urban fantasy novel written by Megan Lindholm and Steven Brust. It blends elements of Hungarian folk tales with a modern-day detective story. The book contains many lyrics to songs that were later recorded to an album called Songs from The Gypsy by Boiled in Lead.

Boiled in Lead is a rock/world-music band based in Minneapolis, Minnesota, and founded in 1983. Tim Walters of MusicHound Folk called the group "the most important folk-rock band to appear since the 1970s." Influential record producer and musician Steve Albini called the band's self-titled first album "the most impressive debut record from a rock band I've heard all year." Their style, sometimes called "rock 'n' reel," is heavily influenced by Celtic music, folk, and punk rock, and has drawn them praise as one of the few American bands of the 1980s and 1990s to expand on Fairport Convention's rocked-up take on traditional folk. Folk Roots magazine noted that Boiled in Lead's "folk-punk" approach synthesized the idealistic and archival approach of 1960s folk music with the burgeoning American alternative-rock scene of the early 1980s typified by Hüsker Dü and R.E.M. The band also incorporates a plethora of international musical traditions, including Russian, Turkish, Bulgarian, Scottish, Vietnamese, Hungarian, African, klezmer, and gypsy music. Boiled in Lead has been hailed as a pioneering bridge between American rock and international music, and a precursor to Gogol Bordello and other gypsy-punk bands. While most heavily active in the 1980s and 1990s, the group is still performing today, including annual St. Patrick's Day concerts in Minneapolis. Over the course of its career, Boiled in Lead has released nearly a dozen albums and EPs, most recently 2012's The Well Below.

<i>Antler Dance</i> 1994 album by Boiled in Lead

Antler Dance is the fourth album by Minneapolis Celtic rock band Boiled in Lead. It was the band's first recording with vocalist/guitarist Adam Stemple, who replaced Todd Menton after his departure in 1992. Founding bassist Drew Miller has called this personnel change the most significant shift in the band's history. Fiddler Josef Kessler also replaced the departed David Stenshoel. Stemple's addition to the band led to a heavier, more heavy metal-influenced sound, as well as a strengthening of the band's ties to the science fiction and fantasy community. Two songs on Antler Dance were co-written by fantasy novelist and Stemple's Cats Laughing bandmate Steven Brust, and "Robin's Complaint" was written by Stemple's mother, novelist Jane Yolen. The album also includes covers of Boney M.'s "Rasputin" and Bruce Springsteen's "State Trooper", originally from his album Nebraska.

Robin Hobb bibliography Wikipedia bibliography

This is a complete list of works by American fantasy author Robin Hobb, the pen name of Margaret Astrid Lindholm Ogden.

<i>Songs from The Gypsy</i> 1995 album by Boiled in Lead

Songs From the Gypsy is the sixth album by Minneapolis Celtic rock band Boiled in Lead, and its second with lead singer/guitarist Adam Stemple. It is a song cycle based on a Hungarian folk tale, written largely by Stemple and his Cats Laughing bandmate Steven Brust several years prior to Boiled in Lead's recording. Brust, who is best known as a fantasy novelist, collaborated with writer Megan Lindholm on a novel, The Gypsy, based on the songs. Boiled in Lead's album is considered the soundtrack to the novel. Brust had previously co-written two songs on Boiled in Lead's 1994 album Antler Dance, and had released a 1993 solo album, A Rose for Iconoclastes.

<i>A Rose for Iconoclastes</i> 1993 studio album by Steven Brust

A Rose for Iconoclastes is a folk album by drummer Steven Brust, an author of fantasy and science fiction novels and a member of the Minneapolis-based band Cats Laughing.

Bibliography of fantasy writer Jane Yolen:

<i>Gather Her Round</i> 2017 novel by Alex Bledsoe

Gather Her Round is an urban fantasy novel by American writer Alex Bledsoe, first published in the United States in March 2017 by Tor Books. It is the fifth in a series of six books by Bledsoe about the Tufa living in a remote Appalachian valley in East Tennessee. The Tufa are descendants of Irish fairies and were found in the area when the first European settlers arrived.

References

  1. "Chris Wallace, Adam Stemple Release Fundamentals of No Limit Hold'em". Poker News Daily. October 14, 2010.
  2. Meyer, Jim (January 5, 1996). "Lojo Russo seeks ethereal accessibility". Star Tribune. p. 02.E.
  3. McDonald, Steven. "Artist Biography: Boiled in Lead". AllMusic.
  4. 1 2 Antler Dance at AllMusic.
  5. Lipsig, Chuck (January 17, 2011). "Boiled in Lead: The Not Quite Complete Recordings". The Green Man Review. Archived from the original on March 18, 2007.
  6. "Discography". Adam Stemple. Archived from the original on 2015-01-04. Retrieved January 4, 2015.
  7. Stemple, Adam (2005). Singer of Souls . Tor Books. ISBN   0-7653-1170-4.
  8. "Novels". Adam Stemple. Archived from the original on 2015-01-04. Retrieved January 4, 2015.
  9. "Locus Awards: Winners by Category". Locus . Archived from the original on 2014-11-23.
  10. Yolen, Jane; Nielsen Hayden, Patrick, eds. (2005). The Year's Best Science Fiction and Fantasy for Teens. Macmillan. ISBN   9780765313836.
  11. Cats Laughing: A Long Time Gone at IMDb
  12. Songs from The Gypsy at Discogs.