Brief Bio for Press
Lisa Bigwood’s songwriting and intense and memorable performances took her from her world as a rural housewife and nurse to the life of a writer and musician. Her previous life came along for the ride, a richness of experience that inhabits her music.
Lisa claims she was born to be a songwriter, and that’s probably true. Crossroads magazine said in a review, “One gets the sense that the music she’s creating is an insistent force that she could no more hold back than a passerby could resist listening.”
Jeff Spevak, of the Rochester Democrat and Chronicle, said, “Bigwood is the scariest folksinger I’ve ever heard.” Proudest of this review, she doesn’t really know why he said it, but guesses: “You know, I have witnessed a lot. I spent a long time in the Trenches of America in my life, and in my career as a nurse: in urban and rural public health, ERs and ICUs, and working in the field of Chemical Dependency treatment. Some of what I have lived and seen was intense. You can probably imagine it. I look in it’s face, and roar back, ‘you frighten me, but you won’t take me’. Along with all the bad things in this world, there remains strength, and so many good things. The life force, the reason to stay here, never goes away. Sometimes I thought it had disappeared, but truly, it never left my side, and I testify to that with a vengeance. I sing of why, given all I’ve personally seen, I still want to get up in the morning.”
This courageous message comes through, and when she writes of joy and laughter and fun, which she does, she means it, and the listener can’t miss that feeling. She laughs and jokes a lot on stage, which is illuminating, given the subject matter she obviously knows intimately.
Her first two studio albums were on the Grammy nominee consideration list, each in the categories of Best Contemporary Folk Album and Album of the Year. They made her a Telluride Troubadour Finalist, Kerrville New Folk Finalist, Chris Austin Memorial Songwriting winner at Merlefest, and took her around the country showcasing her songs. Her music is played on folk radio from New Haven to Cleveland, Chicago to Salt Lake City, Santa Cruz, Guam, and the Faroe Islands.
Of all this attention, she says, “I have found it very refreshing that in this time of mass-programmed media, there are lots of real people out there listening. People who care about words and music. People who know real when they hear it.”
You can download a .pdf of the full bio here: Lisa Bigwood Bio for Press.
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