Mike Dowling is an American roots music guitarist and songwriter who is best known for his solo arrangements on the Grammy Award-winning composition CD Henry Mancini: Pink Guitar . [1] [2] [3] In 2005, Dowling was ranked as one of the twelve best fingerstyle guitarists in the United States. [4]
Dowling was raised in Wisconsin [3] before moving to Nashville. He learned about song structures while taking piano lessons when he was ten years old. [5] Dowling got his first guitar when he was twelve years old.
After dropping out of college, [5] Dowling was hired by fiddler Vassar Clements to play in his touring band, and his playing can be heard on Clement's Grammy-nominated Nashville Jam album. [6] [5] He performed and recorded with jazz violin pioneer Joe Venuti and mandolinist Jethro Burns. [3] In 1991, Dowling released his first solo album, Beats Workin' , featuring Clements. [7] Dowling won a Grammy Award for his solo work on Henry Mancini: Pink Guitar. He designed the El Trovador guitar for National Reso-Phonic Guitars. [8] Dowling was a guest on A Prairie Home Companion. [9]
While in Nashville, Dowling has written songs that were recorded by artists such as Emmylou Harris, Kathy Mattea, Claire Lynch, Del McCoury and George Fox. A recording of his song Backtrackin' by The Nashville Bluegrass Band [7] was nominated Bluegrass Song of the Year in 1994 by the International Bluegrass Music Association. [7]
Dowling lives in Wyoming with his wife Jan. [7] [10] Dowling spends some of his free time as a guitar instructor where he also releases material on Homespun Tapes. [11]
Arthel Lane "Doc" Watson was an American guitarist, songwriter, and singer of bluegrass, folk, country, blues, and gospel music. Watson won seven Grammy awards as well as a Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award. Watson's fingerstyle and flatpicking skills, as well as his knowledge of traditional American music, were highly regarded. Blind from a young age, he performed publicly both in a dance band and solo, as well as for over 15 years with his son, guitarist Merle Watson, until Merle's death in 1985 in an accident on the family farm.
The Nitty Gritty Dirt Band is an American country rock band formed in 1966. The group has existed in various forms since its founding in Long Beach, California. The band's membership has had at least a dozen changes over the years, including a period from 1976 to 1981 when the band performed and recorded as the Dirt Band.
Kevin Roosevelt Moore, known as Keb' Mo', is an American blues musician and five-time Grammy Award winner. He is a singer, guitarist, and songwriter, living in Nashville, Tennessee. He has been described as "a living link to the seminal Delta blues that travelled up the Mississippi River and across the expanse of America". His post-modern blues style is influenced by many eras and genres, including folk, rock, jazz, pop and country. The moniker "Keb Mo" was coined by his original drummer, Quentin Dennard, and picked up by his record label as a "street talk" abbreviation of his given name.
John Marty Stuart is an American country and bluegrass music singer, songwriter, and musician. Active since 1968, Stuart initially toured with Lester Flatt, and then in Johnny Cash's road band before beginning work as a solo artist in the early 1980s. His greatest commercial success came in the first half of the 1990s on MCA Records Nashville. Stuart has recorded over 20 studio albums, and has charted over 30 times on the Billboard Hot Country Songs charts. His highest chart entry is "The Whiskey Ain't Workin'", a duet with Travis Tritt. Stuart has also won five Grammy Awards out of 16 nominations. He is known for his combination of rockabilly, country rock, and bluegrass music influences, his frequent collaborations and cover songs, and his distinctive stage dress. Stuart is also a member of the Grand Ole Opry and Country Music Hall of Fame.
Norman Blake is a traditional American stringed instrument artist and songwriter.
Christopher Scott Thile is an American mandolinist, singer, songwriter, composer, and radio personality, best known for his work in the progressive acoustic trio Nickel Creek and the acoustic folk and progressive bluegrass quintet Punch Brothers. He is a 2012 MacArthur Fellow. In October 2016, he became the host of the radio variety show A Prairie Home Companion, which in December 2017 was renamed Live from Here.
Peter Rowan is an American bluegrass musician and composer. Rowan plays guitar and mandolin, yodels and sings.
Vassar Carlton Clements was an American jazz, swing, and bluegrass fiddler. Clements has been dubbed the Father of Hillbilly Jazz, an improvisational style that blends and borrows from swing, hot jazz, and bluegrass along with roots also in country and other musical traditions.
Geoff Bartley is an American acoustic guitarist and singer-songwriter, whose musical style combines roots, blues, jazz, and traditional folk. He lives in the Boston area, where he can be found at The Cantab Lounge in Cambridge, Massachusetts every Monday night, hosting a singer-songwriter open mic, and every Tuesday night presenting bluegrass performances and jams.
Laurence Ivor Juber, is an English musician, fingerstyle guitarist and studio musician. He played guitar in the rock band Paul McCartney and Wings from 1978 to 1981.
Bryan Sutton is an American musician. Primarily known as a flatpicking acoustic guitar player, Sutton also plays mandolin, banjo, ukulele, and electric guitar. He also sings and writes songs.
Tim Sparks is an American acoustic guitar player, singer, arranger and composer.
Patrick Donohue is an American fingerstyle guitarist born in St. Paul, Minnesota. He is a Grammy nominated, National Fingerpicking Guitar Champion songwriter. Donohue has several albums to his credit and his songs have been recorded by Chet Atkins, Suzy Bogguss, and Kenny Rogers. He has performed on A Prairie Home Companion for many years.
The Great Dobro Sessions is a 1994 country music and bluegrass album featuring an all-star line-up of 10 American resonator guitar players, produced by dobro players Jerry Douglas and Tut Taylor.
Richard Greene is an American violinist who has been described as "one of the most innovative and influential fiddle players of all time". Greene is credited with introducing the chop to fiddle playing while working with Bill Monroe and the Blue Grass Boys, the invention of which he attributes to pain in his wrist and arm and "laziness". He featured the technique in his performances with Seatrain.
Al Petteway is an American guitarist known primarily for his acoustic fingerstyle work both as a soloist and with well-known folk artists such as Amy White, Tom Paxton, Jethro Burns, Jonathan Edwards, Cheryl Wheeler, Debi Smith, Bonnie Rideout, Maggie Sansone and many others. His own compositions rely heavily on Celtic and Appalachian influences and he is known for his use of DADGAD tuning.
Ed Gerhard is an American Grammy Award winning guitarist. He is known for his acoustic fingerstyle guitar playing and lap steel guitar music.
Richard Smith is an English guitarist specialising in the fingerstyle guitar tradition of Merle Travis, Chet Atkins, and Jerry Reed. He is the 2001 National Fingerstyle Guitar Champion.
Jerome Henry "Butch" Baldassari was an American mandolinist, recording artist, composer, and music teacher.
Matt Flinner is an American mandolinist, music transcriber, and ensemble leader. Mike Marshall has called him "one of the truly great young mandolinists of our generation."