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Bio with Bullets
Big Bang Bio
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Where We've Been
Big Bang Bio
I
was born and raised-- the youngest of six children--in Grand Rapids,
Michigan, and started soaking up music almost from my first breath…and
singing and playing it soon after.
In Sunday school, church and school choirs, I learned to sing and harmonize.
Through piano and clarinet lessons, I learned how to read music. Later,
these influences mixed with those of popular music from Simon & Garfunkle,
The Beatles, Joni Mitchell, Bob Dylan and Motown.
A Joan Baez Vanguard recording, though, provided my primary inspiration and
the key to my musical heart. The truth and drama of old songs like John
Riley, Rake and Ramblin’ Boy and Wildwood Flower resonated deeply for me and
Baez’ voice was thrilling.

I begged my parents for a guitar and got one -- a $10 toy, pretty much. And,
with a Mel Bay chord book, I learned every song on that album by ear.
With this, I found my own music and voice. My songwriting began naturally as
the guitar playing improved, and I added music to the poetry I'd been
writing since very young. Here's my first poem:
The
snow falls softly on the ground.
It blows and
scatters without a sound.
It's soft. It's pretty. It's soft as a kitty.
It's nice. It's soft. It falls aloft.
It finds you. It blinds you, but then after all.
It's the prettiest thing that ever did fall.
Throughout college
at Western Michigan University in Kalamazoo, Michigan, I practiced my craft
and performed occasionally. I was mostly a closet "folkie" though, and was quite
shy and self-conscious about lots of things - music included.
It was after graduation that my professional music
career began. It started by surprise when I went to a party and sang
"Don't Get Around Much Any More" with piano player Tom Duffield. I didn't
even know I knew that song!

But it was the beginning of a five-year stint as lead singer with McDuff, a piano,
bass, & guitar trio (Tom Duffield (r) on keyboards and guitar and Ron Deering
(l) on
bass and guitar) that featured folk, contemporary and original tunes with
lots of blues from the likes of Sippie Wallace, Dinah Washington, Bessie Smith
and more.
What a great time we had with McDuff! We usually got the audience involved
and had lots of fun. For me, it was the development of a stage presence and
performance
style that I still practice today--sharing music and engaging audience members.
When bass player Ron Deering left the
group, I continued on for a year with Tom Duffield as
Patty and the Duff.
I followed up this adventure
working with two all-female foursomes.

First,
Leopards on the Loose specialized in a cappella renditions of Motown tunes and camped it up
in 1950’s sunglasses and funky second hand leopard outfits.
Myself and two other members of
that group--Dana Listing and Maria Maki--went on to found the The Recyclettes,
adding Susan Harrison, in a group that blended
percussion, guitar and woodwind accompaniment for original songs, covers from
the 60’s &’70’s, and parodies.
Throughout this time, I also performed in
musical theater and shared original work with dancers, poets and other musicians
in mixed-media cabarets.
In 1995, I
started my solo career, focusing on my songs and style, an amalgam
of all of my influences—firmly rooted in folk tradition, while branching out
into blues, jazz and contemporary singer-songwriter terrain.

In 1996, Bill
Willging—who honed his guitar skills growing up in Colorado and strumming
and jamming his way through several states and schools—joined me as occasional
supporting cast for his first foray into professional music. Bill had (and has)
a lot of native talent, and we worked hard to develop a complementary style
with two guitars. It was a great compliment when blues singer
and guitarist Shari Kane described us as “an enchanting duo that plays together with a rare
perfection and ease, putting one and one together to make more than two.”
Bill was a
major contributor to my first, self-produced recording, Breathing
Under Water, released in 1998. Breathing’s 15 tracks are
straight-forward “what you hear is what you’ll get” productions that mostly
feature me solo and duo with Bill. Joel Mabus’ mandolin is featured on
the title song, and other artists lend a bit of harmony and accompaniment here
and there.
In 2001, I
released time & love, a more thematic recording with 12 tracks that are
lush, colorful, and full of varied, acoustic instrumentation. As on
Breathing, original tunes are featured, but covers are also included.
In
October of that year, Bill & I tied the knot, making us partners in life and
in music. The duo has taken on its own identity though we're still searching
for the right name for it.

Adding a third recording -- Old, New,
Borrowed, Blue -- in 2006, solo and duo acts have kept up a steady schedule, reaching out to arrange
bookings throughout the Midwest and in Colorado. That was greatly helped by
an Gilmore Emerging Artist Grant that funded the development and
distribution of promotional materials throughout the Midwest. Thanks to
that, we now have visited lots of venues and hope to return to them all--sooner or later.
I am so grateful to be able to make music. I’m all about music, singing, playing,
writing…and most of all—sharing music…carrying on the folk tradition and being
part of its preservation and evolution. I look forward to more and more of it!
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