Custom Made Woman: A Life in Traditional Music

Custom Made Woman: A Life in Traditional MusicAlice Gerrard, an award winning and storied folk and bluegrass musician for over 50 years, is one of the notable few women in a heavily male genre. Custom Made Woman tells Gerrards story through the music, the folk festivals, the kids, and the relationshipsboth personal and professionalthat defined her storied life and career. Her collaborations with Appalachian singer Hazel Dickens during the 1960s and 1970s were pivotal recordings during the decades

Alice Gerrard, an award-winning and storied folk and bluegrass musician for over 50 years, is one of the notable few women in a heavily male genre. Custom Made Woman tells Gerrard’s story through the music, the folk festivals, the kids, and the relationships—both personal and professional—that defined her storied life and career. Her collaborations with Appalachian singer Hazel Dickens during the 1960s and 1970s were pivotal recordings during the decades after the American folk music boom of the midcentury; the duo produced four albums that have recently been rereleased by Rounder Records and Smithsonian Folkways. In addition to Dickens, Gerrard has worked with folks like Tommy Jarrell, Enoch Rutherford, Otis Burris, Luther Davis, and Matokie Slaughter, and founded The Old-Time Herald, based in Durham, North Carolina, serving as its editor-in-chief from 1987 until 2003.