Tom Draughon Bio & Discography
Click HERE for Tom's PROMO PAGE Tom Draughon is the owner of and executive producer for Heartistry Music, a record label devoted to music and artists of the Lake Superior region.. A notable performer and enthusiast of acoustic music, in addition to vocal skill in multiple genres Tom plays a wide variety of instruments, including guitar, violin, banjo, mandolin, bass, renaissance lute and piano. He has performed with Tom Paxton, Bryan Bowers, John McCutcheon, Molly and the Makers, Don Pedi, Randy Sabien, and Bruce Burnside among others, and appears as a session musician on over 25 recordings as well as on his own CDs "The Fox", "Kids on the Mountain", "Indian Summer", "Second Wind", and Season of Delight. Tom currently performs solo and with hisTrueGrass Trio bluegrasss group.
Tom has been a cast member in multiple different shows at Lake Superior Big Top Chautauqua. He also has served as Adjunct Lecturer in Music at Northland College in Ashland, Wisconsin where he taught guitar, violin / fiddle, voice, and multiple fretted string instruments including banjo, mandolin, bass, mountain dulcimer and ukulele. Click here for BIOGRAPHY: MORE ABOUT TOM
FILMOGRAPHY Tom has contributed soundtrack music to these documentaries from KSPS TV
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Uncharted Territory
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Public Television
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Courage In Corsets
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Public Television
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BOOKS: Companion songbooks to CDs of Voyageur
Songs
DISCOGRAPHY: Tom appears on all of these great recordings:
Tom Has Appeared At These Fine Venues:
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Weber Music Hall, UMD
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Belle Chere Festival, Asheville, NC
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Lake Superior Big Top Chautauqua
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Mabel Tainter Theater,
Menominee, WI |
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Overture Center, The Playhouse |
Grand Theater, Wausau, WI
(with Tom Paxton and with Bruce Burnside) |
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Mitchell Auditorium,
College of St. Scholastica |
Thomas Wolfe Auditorium,
Asheville, NC |
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ESPN Great Outdoor Games
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A Prairie Home Companion
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Edinburgh Folk Festival
Edinburgh, Scotland |
Mountain Dance and Folk Festival, Asheville, NC
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MN Public Radio Morning Show
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Barron Arts Center, Barron, WI
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Shawano Folk Festival
(with Tom Paxton and with Take 3) |
Two Harbors Folk Festival, Two Harbors, MN
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WOJB Concert Series
(with Tom Paxton) |
Fiddlers Grove, Statesville, NC
(with Don Pedi) |
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Festival du Voyageur,
Winnipeg, Manitoba |
Great Northern Bluegrass Festival, Mole Lakes, WI
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Enzion Theatre, Orlando, FL
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McDibb's, Black Mountain, NC
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Bob Dylan Festival, Duluth, MN
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The Coffeehaus, Northland College
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LCO Casino (With Randy Sabien
and Kevin McMullin) |
Iron World, Chisolm, MN
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Ashland Folk Festival, Ashland, WI
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StageNorthl, Washburn, WI
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BIOGRAPHY: Tom Draughon is the real thing. Born in North Carolina and raised in the mountains of Virginia and West Virginia, there is no finer performer of traditional Appalachian music. A consumate instrumentalist, Tom renders authentic fiddle tunes, banjo songs, flat and finger-picked guitar styles combined with clear vocals to bring the mountains to you. His experience in other genres of traditional music and his virtuoso guitar technique bring a unique polish to his performances. Tom has performed and recorded with such artists as Patrick Sky, Tom Paxton, Don Pedi, Bruce Greene, Randy Sabien, Kevin McMullin, Bruce Burnside, Sheila Adams, Jim Taylor, Timmy Abell, and many others. His latest CD with his trio Take 3 is finished and due for release in early 2012. Tom is the founder, owner and executive producer of Heartistry Music.
Tom was born in North Carolina. The son of a jazz pianist, Tom quickly took to music, singing and playing ukelele by age 5. Tom was captivated by the Beatles' first appearance on the Ed Sullivan show, and by age 9 was performing on teleramas. Tom has always had diverse musical interests and has been influenced by many genres from Bach to R.E.M. Tom took a keen interest in traditional folk music while still in high school in the early 70's, idolizing Doc Watson, John Hartford, the Red Clay Ramblers He also took a keen interest in instrumental fingerstyle guitar, revering such artists as Leo Kottke, John Renbourn, John Fahey, Bert Jansch, Robert Johnson and others.
Tom performed throughout his his high school and college years, writing guitar instrumentals, and performing many traditional tunes and songs as well as writing and arranging for his bands Wild Oats and Second Wind. Though he graduated from Northland College with a B.S. (you know what THAT stands for ... ), he continued to perform throughout Wisconsin with these bands and as a solo artist. Wild Oats can be heard on Wisconsin Public Radio's album, "A Simply Folk Sampler".
Moving back to North Carolina to live in the Appalachian Mountains in and around Asheville, Tom began playing and performing with mountain dulcimer virtuoso Don Pedi and many others including Jim Taylor, Patrick Sky, Bruce Greene, Martin Fox, David Wilcox, Sheila K. Adams, Timmy Abell, Michael Garner, Joe and Karen Holbert, David Skinner, and more. While in Asheville, he recorded his album, "Second Wind", as well as recording with Don Pedi, Jim Taylor, Sheila K. Adams, Bruce Greene, and Joe & Karen Holbert. He also created and hosted the Public Radio program "Second Wind" on WCQS, The Mountain Air Network, where he hosted and interviewed many well known folk music celebrities. Many performed live on his show.
Upon moving back to the Lake Superior region in the early 1990s Tom helped form the band Way Up North, resurrected the vocal group Sons of the Voyageur, and founded the record label Heartistry Music with the release of his CD "Kids On The Mountain". Heartistry Music now represents Tom and multiple other artists from the area.
Tom now resides in northern Wisconsin by Lake Superior, where he still performs,
records and produces for Heartistry Music and organizes a series of folk dances.
Recent collaborations include forming and recording the "Folk Nouveau"
trio Take 3, recording with Bruce Burnside and Kevin McMullin, singing music
of the Voyageurs, and performing at select venues throughout the US.
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