Rachel Harrington: Bio
Full Biography
NOW PLAYING: “I am absolutely enchanted with this record! A brilliant debut ... already a leading contender for Album of the Year in my opinion!” ~ Bob Harris, BBC Radio
Top 12 DIY Pick: "Rachel's voice has just the right combination of temerity and twang" ~ Performing Songwriter
“IT’S A CRACKER! The challenge is finding only one area to highlight. ” [14 top-seller, April 2007] ~ Miles of Music
FIVE STARS! “Absolutely brilliant! The best debut since Gillian’s ‘96 Revival.” ~ Ctrl. Alt. Country
“A top-drawer Americana debut .” [4 top-seller, May 2007] ~ Smart Choice Music, UK
“A roots musician in the truest and purest sense... like reading a beautifully written novel ... haunting.” ~ NetRhythms
“Dolly Parton, Emmylou Harris, Gillian Welch...Rachel Harrington. These comparisons don’t seem far-fetched at all given the extraordinary excellence of this debut.” ~ Glitterhouse
“Rachel’s voice is one of the many highlights on this record ... steeped in the past [with] an oddly current feel.” ~ Americana UK
Bluegrass Unlimited: "'The Bootlegger's Daughter' is an ideal vehicle showcasing [Rachel's] multiple talents and should prove to be a significant landmark in her musical career."
FOUR STARS!
~ Mojo
~ The Irish Times
~ The London Sun
::bio::
Reared among the Pentecostal pines of Oregon, Rachel Harrington has been doing things in the wrong order for quite some time. She'd had extensive radio play before performing her live show, and she was opening for Grammy winners and nominees before releasing her first record.
Rachel's critically acclaimed 2007 debut, The Bootlegger's Daughter, (featuring guest musicians John Reischman and Danny Barnes) went to #1 on the Euro-Americana Chart and landed the Seattle siren smack in the center of the UK Americana scene when legendary BBC dj Bob Harris proclaimed Bootlegger's Daughter one of the best albums of the year. The following year of aggressive touring saw Harrington playing festivals in a dozen countries with some of the top names in bluegrass and country music.
Rachel's 2008 follow-up record, CITY OF REFUGE, features several guests including Tim O'Brien and Pieta Brown. Peopled with characters seeking respite, escape or salvation, CITY OF REFUGE farms personal and mythical stories from the American West, including tales inspired by the memoirs of prostitutes during the Alaska Gold Rush, the cantankerous Harry Truman of Mt. St. Helens, and short story writer (and fellow Oregonian) Raymond Carver. The album is produced by Evan Brubaker and mixed by David Ferguson (Johnny Cash's American Recordings III & IV), released on Rachel's own SkinnyDennis Records. City of Refuge has garnered further acclaim, reaching millions of listeners when Starbucks requested three of the cds 10 tracks for in-store play throughout the US, supported by national US distribution from Burnside.
In 2009, after two years spent mostly on the road touring internationally (including headline spots the Glasgow Americana Festival (Scotland) and the Maverick Festival (England)), Harrington began to be touted as the hardest working woman in Americana. She released a live album, In The Woods, recorded live in The Netherlands, which received only limited pressing and release, intended to be simply a document of those years on the road.
2010 sees Rachel back on the road and back in the studio, with the new album's official release set for November 1, 2010 in Europe. Watch this page for further details ...
::history::
Rachel Harrington grew up in a small town in Oregon with a deep Pentecostal upbringing, from families of Danish dairymen and Irish lumberjacks. As a child, her only exposure to music was gospel - that and her father's secret Stax/Motown collection he'd amassed since his return from Vietnam. She especially loved the black gospel groups, the secular Otis Redding and Sam Cooke.
"I remember being a little girl, like 8 and 9, and my folks would leave to go to church often in the evenings and I'd beg to stay behind at home - when they left I'd turn out all the lights and put on the Otis Redding records and stand in front of the big window in the living room, singing into this broken little microphone I'd gotten somewhere."
At the age of 12, after a stay with an aunt and uncle in Montana, she fell in love with horses and began to ride and participate in rodeo events. Out on the ranch one day, she met an old cowboy named Dutch who spent many hours giving the novice rider lessons - during which he listened to his favorite radio station: "stone country." This provided critical exposure to the likes of Hank Williams Sr., Loretta Lynn, and George Jones.
"Hearing Loretta Lynn changed my life. Finally, I had someone I could actually sing like. And it was then I also realized the connection between country and soul. First time I heard Hank Williams I knew he was coming from the same place as Ray Charles - you can just hear it." Around this time, a family friend gave Rachel her first guitar.
Shortly after, her parents divorced, her mother remarried, and the new family moved Texas. Just out of her teens, Rachel had a son and lived in Houston for 5 or 6 years, eventually returning to the Northwest. She spent the latter part of the '90's putting herself through college as a single parent.
"I was writing a lot then, during my college years, a lot of short stories - but did very little music. Weekends I sang in a honkytonk band - called Little Lotta Dickens and the Pulltab Playboys. That was a lot of fun, but that's all it was to me, just a hobby. Most of life, music was just a hobby. It wasn't until 2001, after my second son was stillborn, that I began to take music seriously." Following a long year of grieving, she says, "I just didn't want to be that little girl in the window anymore. Life's too short for that."
In January, 2004, Rachel released a homemade demo EP called Halloween Leaves and began to play open mics. Shortly, she was opening for many of her songwriting heroes: Guy Clark, Eliza Gilkyson, and Todd Snider. She then began work on a proper debut album. "The Bootlegger's Daughter" was released on Rachel's own SkinnyDennis Records in May 2007. Bootlegger went to #1 on the Euro-Americana Chart, #36 on the Americana Music Association Chart, and was hailed by BBC's legendary Bob Harris as "already a contender for album of the year." Rachel booked her own 3-week overseas tour, came home, and got right back into the studio. The following year, 2008, she released her second full-length cd, "City of Refuge," while in the midst an exhaustive 3 month overseas tour, which she again booked herself.
"Musicians often ask me how I got a booking agent," she says. "Two words: Hard. Work."
There were many highlights in 2008, including two performances at the sold-out Larmer Tree Festival in England. Also, while still on tour in 08, Rachel got news that Starbucks had picked up "City of Refuge" and wanted three of its tracks for in-store play immediately. At the end of the summer, Bluegrass Bluewaters Festival asked Rachel to teach a songwriting workshop with The Greencards and Martha Scanlan.
2009 sees Rachel returning overseas for another 3 months of constant touring, playing theaters, arts centers, and many fine venues, including a headline spot at the Glasgow Americana Festival.
As a third generation Oregonian, from great-grandparents who moved westward from Texas, Harrington feels a strong connection to place and to creating music that, at least in part, captures some of the stories and heritage of The West. She holds a Bachelor's degree in Pacific Northwest Bioregional Studies from Fairhaven College in Bellingham, Washington and completed Master's work in Environmental Conflict Resolution at NAU in Flagstaff, Arizona.
During her college years, Rachel also studied creative writing with critically acclaimed author Ann Cummins and began to write short stories.
"If anything, I think I'm actually a short story writer. The story always comes first."
::awards & achievements::
* 2006 Falcon Ridge Folk Festival, Emerging Artist Showcase
* 2006 WCS International Song Contest, honorable mention
* 2005 gig harbor songwriter competition winner
* 2005 old no. 9 music scholarship winner
::selected festivals & venues::
* 2008 Crawley Folk Festival (UK)
* 2008 Perth Southern Fried Festival (UK)
* 2008 Glasgow Americana Festival (UK)
* 2008 Devon Folk Festival (UK)
* 2008 Larmer Tree Music Festival (UK)
* 2008 Stamford Guitar Festival (UK)
* 2008 Leigh-on-Sea Folk Festival (UK)
* 2008 Bluewaters Bluegrass Festival (WA)
* 2008 Rivercity Bluegrass Festival (WA)
* 2007, 2005 Gig Harbor Folk Festival (WA)
* 2007 Bainbridge Bluegrass Festival (WA)
* 2006 Falcon Ridge Folk Festival (NY)
* 2006 Not Yer Daddy's Grass (bluegrass festival) (OR)
* 2005 NW Pickathon (OR)
* 2004, 2005, 2006 NW Folklife (WA)
* The Tractor Tavern, Seattle
* The Triple Door, Seattle
* Aladdin Theater, Portland
* Billy Block's Western Beat, Nashville
::selected openings & festival stage-shares::
* shawn colvin
* the greencards
* guy clark
* david wilcox
* marty stuart
* lucy kaplansky
* jim lauderdale
* todd snider
* david lindley
* fred eaglesmith
* eliza gilkyson
* tracy grammer
* infamous stringdusters
* the be good tanyas
* jolie holland
* danny barnes
* amelia white
* last train home
* martha scanlan
* jesse sykes
* del mccoury
* foghorn stringband
* eilen jewel
* tim o'brien
* the wilders
HI RES PHOTOS:
By Michael Bauer
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