Madison Baptist Church    6202 N. 12th Street    Phoenix AZ 85014

KAREN MUELLER
www.karenmueller.com
Karen Mueller is one of the top autoharp and mountain dulcimer players today. Her exciting and innovative performing style, featuring Appalachian, Celtic and contemporary music, has been applauded by critics and audiences from LA to Boston. Bluegrass Unlimited magazine has said "Karen Mueller's touch, timing and taste make her a true virtuoso. Her talent and clarity ... deserve a wide audience." Karen won the 1986 International Autoharp Championship and was a National Dulcimer finalist in 1985, both at the Walnut Valley Festival in Winfield, KS. A native of Winfield, she first attended the festival while in high school and was inspired to learn to play the autoharp and dulcimer by the performers she saw there.

Karen has made her mark on the acoustic music scene as both an interpreter of tradition and an innovator, performing with such legendary artists as Liz Carroll (all-Ireland fiddle champion) and Tony Trischka (banjo master). She has recorded three critically acclaimed solo CDs: Clarity, Still Point and Autoharp Gourmet, and is featured on the Masters of the Mountain Dulcimer II and Autoharp Legacy CDs. Karen is also the author of Mel Bay Publishing's Celtic Autoharp book and contributor to their Dulcimer 2000 anthology.

While touring extensively as a soloist, she also currently works in the band of Katie McMahon, original lead singer of Riverdance. Karen is an accomplished multi-instrumentalist; besides autoharp and dulcimer, she plays guitar, mandolin, Irish bouzouki and bass dulcimer. In 2000, the Minnesota Bluegrass and Old-Time Music Association awarded Karen its “Recognition of Excellence.” She has also been an official showcase artist at the North American Folk Alliance Conference.

Based in Minneapolis, Karen is in demand as a performer, studio musician, school residency artist and instructor. She gives private lessons in the Twin Cities to around 50 students of all ages and levels at West Bank School of Music and Homestead Pickin’ Parlor. Karen is also on the rosters of Young Audiences of Minnesota and the State Arts Board’s Folk Arts Directory.

“In the hands of a few gifted people, the Autoharp can swell into the sound of a whole orchestra. Karen Mueller is one of those few.” —Minneapolis Star Tribune

DREW SMITH
drew-smith-autoharp-emporium@verizon.net
Drew is a veteran performer and workshop leader, who has developed a unique "thumb lead" style of playing ... which captures melody notes of fast fiddle tunes on his autoharp. He loves to play the chromatic autoharp, because it gives him all the needed notes and chords to be able to play the wide world of music that simply eludes the more limited diatonic harp. As a 25 year band member with Roger Sprung & the Progressive Bluegrassers, he has performed throughout the northeast including at Lincoln Center in NYC, and at the Philadelphia Folk Festival at least 18 times. With other Old-Time band members, Drew is part of a prize winning group called Ben Borscht and the Beats. In the New York/New Jersey area he regularly performs with two groups: Double Play! and Triple Play All-Stars. He is also a member of the Autoharp Hall of Fame.

You are as likely to hear Drew strike up a Russian tango as a Blues, or a Dixieland tune from the 20's. He started playing Old-Time tunes, and went on to learn numbers from all over the world, teaching many of them at his workshops. He has performed and demonstrated his style and techniques at the Augusta Heritage Center, California Autoharp Gathering, California Summer Solstice Festival, Cranberry Dulcimer & Autoharp Gathering, Mountain Laurel Autoharp Gathering, Ozark Folk Center, Swannanoa Gathering, Willamette Valley Autoharp Gathering, as well as at Folk Music Club weekends throughout the northeast.

Drew is a two time winner of both the Mountain Laurel Autoharp Championships, and the International Autoharp Championships. After his first win at Walnut Valley in 1984, Drew set to work and created a four volume series featuring up to 9 different winners over the years of the contest, called "WINFIELD WINNERS -- AUTOHARP!"... all four now on CD's. These albums are reputed to be some of the best of today's pure autoharp recordings! Drew also developed his own "Play-by-Ear" Autoharp Workshop learning system ( 2 one-hour tapes plus a 20 page workbook), to teach beginning autoharp players. And after performing on numerous recordings of others, Drew's first solo CD, called "Now, that's AUTOHARP!" is a collection of Southern Mountain tunes, also including Russian, Turkish, Ladino, Arabic, Blues, Show Tunes, plus tunes from the 20's, and some gospel ... and in 2009 at age 80, Drew still rides his motorcycles!

Drew's brand new CD is called "The ART of the AUTOHARP!" and has 19 exotic tunes which include Tangos, Old-Time, a Polka, Pop, Dixieland, and Brazilian, Italian, French, Russian and other ethnic tunes. It has some real surprises.

ALEX USHER
ooharp@aol.com
Alex Usher, the 2004 International Autoharp champion, is not only a fine performer but an excellent teacher as well. Her workshop credits include Mountain Laurel, the Ozark Folk Center, the Gateway Dulcimer Festival, Gebhard Woods, and Autumn Acoustics. At the Music Folk store in St. Louis she is the staff autoharpist. She delights in getting folks “hooked” on the autoharp. As a late convert who spent many years performing as a guitar-picking folksinger, she wishes she had not allowed her autoharp to languish so many years in the closet before falling in love with it.

Her fourth Mel Bay publication “Side-splitters”, a collection of 125 funny songs, jokes, parodies, etc. has recently been released. Previous Mel Bay books are “Basic Melodic Autoharp Solos”, “Scottish Airs and Ballads arranged for the autoharp (with CD)” and “Childrens’ Song Favorites”. She has contributed articles to the Autoharp Quarterly since it was founded.

“Heathery Isle” is the last-issued CD she has recorded, and she hopes to release a new one soon.

LINDA HUBER
lhuber3@localnet.com
Linda is a well-known local performer. She plays the autoharp at many venues including churches, retirement communities, festivals, restaurants, etc. Her repertoire is varied, as well, ranging from old-time fiddle tunes to songs by contemporary composers. She teaches private lessons, leads workshops at festivals, and has taught classes through adult education programs. She can also do maintenance and simple repair work. She founded the Angel Strings Autoharp Club, which meets the first Monday evening of each month. She also arranges classical tunes for the autoharp which are published in Autoharp Quarterly. Linda is a graduate of Lebanon Valley College, Annville, PA and is a former music teacher. She has been a school-bus driver for 14 years and presently works in that capacity as a substitute. She and her husband live in the Pigeon Hills outside of Hanover, PA with his dog and their seven cats. She has two grown children who are both professional musicians.

BILL BRYANT
billbryant@cyberport.net
Bill Bryant has been playing the autoharp since 1963. He taught himself to play melody, sing, and make all his own adjustments, modifications and repairs for 22 years before he ever met another autoharp player. He attended the Walnut Valley Festival for the first time in 1986 and competed in the International Autoharp Championship. Four years later, his talent and unique playing style won him the 1990 Championship. Since then, he has produced four albums of his own, played on “Winfield Winners” vols. 3 & 4, as well as the Autoharp Legacy CD set. His 54-minute “Autoharp Workshop” video, for beginning, intermediate, or advanced players, shows his secrets of playing the autoharp in ways that no one else has mastered. Although Bill is now living in Montana, and not often seen in the mainstream of autoharp festivals, he still performs, teaches (locally), writes songs and makes improvements on autoharp design. He is active with the internet group, “Cyberpluckers” and has posted videos on “You Tube”.

HAL WEEKS
Hal Weeks has been a professional singer, storyteller and autoharp player for over fifteen years. He is mainly active in the area of folk music, ranging from Popular and Gospel music of the early 1900's to blues and the music of Ireland. He has appeared at folk and bluegrass festivals, retirement communities, elementary schools, preschools, libraries, churches, and summer camps. In 1996 he won the National Autoharp Championship in Avoca, Iowa. He has also appeared on television and radio.

Hal is an active member of the Arizona Autoharp Club, and has been offering autoharp lessons in the Phoenix area for the past several years. Most recently, his formal education in music theory has helped him to work with Todd Crowley in the development of the FDCA chromatic chord bar arrangement, which they will be discussing and demonstrating in their workshop.

TODD CROWLEY
From his first introduction to the Arizona Autoharpers and the Phoenix Folk Festival in March 2006, Todd Crowley has been traveling widely with his Dia’Todd’Nics Autoharp Play Station. He has appeared at the last two California Autoharp Gatherings in 2006-’07, the Mountain Laurel Autoharp Gathering in 2006, and The Arizona Autoharp Festival in 2007. He has also been the staff instructor in Beginning Autoharp at Common Ground on the Hill in Westminster, Maryland.

A folk singer at heart, Todd with his wife Jeanne has compiled two teaching songbooks for autoharp and voice. The first one, inspired by Woody Guthrie, is titled We Come with the Dust: Songs of the Migrant Experience. Todd has presented his Migrants’ Songs Workshop at CAG, MLAG, and the AAF, as well giving a weeklong class at Common Ground. For the Arizona Autoharp Fiesta in 2008, Todd will be presenting his latest songbook, inspired by the Civil Rights Movement, titled We Shall Overcome: Songs of Protest and Peace.

Todd credits his being “discovered” in the Autoharp World to Barbara and Chuck Giamalvo, whom he met at the WoodyFest in the summer of 2005 after he retired from 30 years of high school English teaching. Through Barbara’s invitation, Todd has been welcomed into the Arizona Autoharp community where he has teamed up with Hal Weeks to develop a tandem bar playing style, now called the Diachromic set-up. From his work on the Diachromic, which yields over a 100 chords with just 24 chord bars on a chromatic autoharp, Todd has also developed his own Diapentic set-ups for one and two key diatonic ‘harps.

For his workshops at the Arizona Autoharp Fiesta in 2008, Todd will focus on his Diapentic tandem bar set-up and his We Shall Overcome songbook. This will be the third winter in a row Todd will be visiting the Arizona Autoharp community, a getaway he now can’t imagine missing.