Northern Lights

Biographie

Championing the traditions of bluegrass and American folk, Northern Lights were a hard-twanging, heavy-jigging force on the New England music scene for over 30 years and helped kick-start the careers of Alison Krauss and Alison Brown. Originally formed in Boston, mandolin player Taylor Armerding and guitarist/bassist Bob Emery led the band as they recorded their self-titled debut album in 1976, but they went their separate ways soon after.

After a five year break it took young banjo picker Alison Brown to cajole the band back into action, and she toured and played on their second record 'Before the Fire Comes Down' in 1983. The oddity of musicians from Massachusetts playing traditional country and Appalachian tunes was striking at the time, but a local scene soon emerged and the band's progressive, contemporary take on the genre went on to produce the acclaimed albums 'Can't Buy Your Way' featuring Grammy-winning fiddler Vasser Clements and 'Wrong Highway Blues'. Amerding's son Jake joined the band in the '90s and they remained leading figures within the bluegrass community and regulars at festivals and folk clubs, but gradually began to break up in the mid-2000s. Guitarist Bill Henry kept things going on later albums 'New Moon' and 'One Day', but the band eventually split in 2010.

Artist biography compiled by BDS/West 10. All rights reserved