Emily Mure

I realize that in this community of old hippies, post-punk latter-day newbie-parental types and the occasional bluegrass traditionalist who stumbles here by mistake because they think we all love to hear the "Orange Blossom Special" covered the same way six thousand times, that I sometimes stand alone. Well maybe not alone, but sort of to the left of the main event. The reason being is that I suck up new music and young(er) musicians like a Dyson on a shag carpet. And despite my posts in the last eleven months about Jules Shear and his wife Pal Shazar (four times), Lou Reed, the Smithereens (just once each) and Grateful Dead (twice)...much of what I listen to is from people in their twenties and thirties, and sometimes even their teens. This year at a Rosh Hashanah dinner I found myself defending Miley as being as relevant as Beethoven...or maybe it was Woody or Pete. And Taylor Swift? Dig her.

Let me tell you how I listen to new music, no matter who, new, young, old or how established the artist is. Fast. Yes, I admit that while skimming quickly on the iTunes player or Spotify is not very fair or friendly, and devalues the art and hard work that goes into it, its how I roll. If it catches my ear, it's a keeper. If not, it gets the hook. Gong Show style. The ones I find interesting get placed in a one thousand song playlist and they stay with me for at least three weeks, and get listened to either in a shuffle mode or maybe end to end if I'm really enthralled.

Say hello to Emily Mure, and her latest album Odyssey.

I found her music last July, after reading about her on another website. It went into the aforementioned playlist and has stayed there ever since. And, to be utterly honest, it's not because I fell in love with it straight off, but because it haunted and challenged me. There was/is something about her songs and voice that made me want to go off into a quiet place and to be sure I captured each and every note. She surprised me too. When I expected the melody to go up the scale, it went down. When you think it's time for a minor chord transition, she shifts to a major key. And just when you're pretty sure you've got your basic coffee house folky singer-songwriter, she slips into that chamber mojo mode where people like Marissa Nadler and Meg Baird live, and then out of nowhere...I mean like an Ali left jab...you get a pedal steel, oboe and a cello thrown at you. Bam.

She's a New York City girl who attended a performing arts high school, studied classical music and played the oboe at Carnegie and Avery Fisher Halls while still in her teens. At college she studied Oboe Performance and Psychology...and for the life of me I can't figure out if that's one major or two. Some college kids get into dope, drink and sex...she succumbed to folk, bluegrass and the guitar. Falling in love with traditional Irish music, she took off across the Atlantic for a summer studying Celtic music at the University of Limerick. After she came back home to finish her studies at Ithaca College, she moved to Galway and busked in the streets for six months.

"I moved out to Ireland with my best friend from college. At the time I was in need of escape and after spending some time in Ireland a few years before for an Irish/trad summer program, I decided to go back to explore the country further. I didn't go with the intention of singing on the streets- I wanted to just travel. We got temporary work visas and I was having trouble finding a job. After one afternoon busking, I decided I would try to do this for income- and so I did (for a very modest but livable income) It was challenging which is why it was great. I learned so much about myself and it thickened my skin and gave me confidence."

By 2009 she was back in New York and recording her first album, while performing on the vibrant folk circuit that we have in this part of the world, from Pennsylvania to Maine. In 2012 she started getting some airtime on television and began recording the current album...which is available at all the usual places like here and here and here and here.

Emily has been touring and doing shows to support the new album, and as all DIY artists do, she has her day job of teaching guitar to help pay the bills. Given her background, I asked her if she was involved in the classical world. "I still play the oboe but mainly for fun. I am thinking about getting back into ensemble playing but for now- it's mostly just a hobby. I'm enjoying writing for my oboist- Emily DiAngelo. I love the oboe but didn't love the repertoire or the classical music atmosphere which is why I made the shift once I started playing guitar and writing songs. Felt like folk and songwriting was more me."

While learning about Emily as I prepared to write this, I made an interesting discovery. She is the granddaughter of the man known as The Supersonic Guitar Man, Billy Mure. He is is best known for his "incredible albums of sizzling guitar work and tape pyrotechnics. His first album, recorded for RCA Victor, was Super-Sonic Guitars In Hi-Fi. Released in 1957 in glorious mono, it featured Mure playing four guitars with two sets of drums and one bass player. In 1963, he left RCA, where he'd been on the A&R staff, and formed his own independent production company, BM Productions. He worked with a variety of pop and rock and roll acts and achieved at least one chart topper with Marcie Blane's hit, "Bobbie's Girl." (www.spaceagepop.com)

Billy was also a composer, session man, producer and arranger, and you've no doubt grown up with hearing much of the music he's had a hand in. He wrote the arrangement for one of Della Reese’s biggest hits, “My Heart Reminds Me,” as well as Bobby Freeman’s early rock hits, “Do You Want to Dance?” and “Betty Lou’s Got a New Pair of Shoes,” and Ray Peterson’s “Tell Laura I Love Her.” He also wrote the score for two Kim Novak films “Five Against the House” and “No Down Payment.”
As a studio musician, he played on Paul Anka’s “Diana,” Marty Robbins’ “White Sport Coat and a Pink Carnation,” Bobby Darren’s “Splish Splash” and Johnny Mathis’ “Chances Are.” Guitar Player magazine a few years ago named Mure a “Legend of 50s Rock.”

On September 25th, at age 97, Billy Mure passed away. Emily wrote:

"My grandfather started playing music at 5 years old and played gigs regularly up until a couple of weeks before he passed. He came down for my release show in July and gifted me his banjo that Arthur Godfrey gave to him. One week before he passed, we went to visit him down in Florida. I was fortunate enough to play some of my songs for him at his bedside. The man was almost completely deaf at that point, but he asked for my song “This Place”, one of his favorites from my new album, Odyssey, and he sang along with me on some of the “oooo’s” in the song. He sang some of his own songs and we sang with him, and he asked to play my guitar, which he did from his bed. He passed peacefully at 97 years old, just a month and a half shy of his 98th birthday, with loved ones by his side." - No Depression

If her voice doesn’t get you, her lyrics will. This is a quiet album. Don’t expect any flashiness here. But that’s because Mure doesn’t need flash. She’s confident in herself and she has every right to be. Odyssey is muted and contemplative, but it’s not without emotional pull. Mure’s smoky voice and spare arrangements make for an arresting combination. It helps that she’s classically trained and has studied for pretty much all of her young life. She picked up guitar in college, fell in love with Irish music, and never looked back.

There’s a bit of a Celtic Breeze blowing through these acoustic songs, but for the most part they belong in folk music alongside artists like Ani DiFranco- introspective, unorthodox, and powerful. - Adobe and Teardrops

In 2 weeks, Emily Mure will be releasing her follow up to 2009’s Where I Began. Odyssey, her sophomore album, was one of my most anticipated records of 2013. And now I have it. And now it is one of my favorite records of 2013.

Emily’s grown as a songwriter so much in the past 4 years. Musically, lyrically, emotionally. And Odyssey feels like a totally complete, intricate piece. This record is deeply personal and at times (I’m looking at you, “The Tea Kettle Song”) almost painfully relatable. ”But Mr. Dalai Lama, they neglected me first.” Woof. Cut right through my heart.

"If I Were Water" is straight up one of the best country songs I’ve heard in the past 5 years.
The above song, “Joanne 6”, is an early favorite on the record. Probably the most adventurous song I’ve heard from Emily, every risk pays off. It is absolutely heartbreaking in the most beautifully fulfilling way. Her voice is as soft and strong as ever.

Emily is Lisa Hannigan at her most vulnerable, Laura Veirs at her most interesting, Marissa Nadler at her most ethereal. But Emily is all her own. She’s the best of all of these rolled into one.

Odyssey is ambitious and honest and, honestly, just overwhelmingly enjoyable. It’s fueled by nostalgia but drives towards the future rather than dwelling in it. It longs for the past, but learns from it too. It’s the perfect soundtrack to wind down your summer and carry you through to the next one.
I can’t recommend it enough. - more songs than a song convention

“(Odyssey is) a close-up and sometimes haunting folk album from New York City's Emily Mure. Confessional songwriting with delicate production. Emily's training as a classical oboist allows her to compose chamber folk arrangements that illuminate these songs and create a lush environment for her breathy vocals.” - the modern folk music of america

"One part jazzy vocal, one part classical arrangement, one part folk songwriter equate to ALL parts really fantastic music. Emily Mure is a New York based songwriter releasing her sophomore effort “Odyssey” at the end of July. Classically trained musically, but self-taught as a songwriter, she is able to appreciate what a lot of musicians are not, and that is a delicate balance (which is strongly displayed in the instrument arrangement and warm, poignant harmonies throughout the record). Emily has something, I am not sure what “it” is, but she has got IT.

The sample track “Unfettered” is my first dive into Emily’s music and I am immediately in love (which is saying a lot because I am very picky about my favorite female musicians). There are just enough moving parts to make the song’s character shine, but it’s not overcrowded. A steady acoustic guitar, a nice flowing rhythm section, and some tasteful, distant guitar lines is all that is really needed to back Mure’s light but soulful airy vocal. And the harmonies lended by songwriter Michaela Anne perfectly complement the chorus with it’s catchy hook and infectious melody:

"I meant to say in person, or in a letter / I meant to let you know my heart's for you, unfettered."
Check her out online, buy the new record, and support a really great artist." - Red Line Roots

"New York-based songstress Emily Mure delivers her self-released, self-produced and self-assured sophomore full-length Odyssey on July 30, an album of unpretentious, straight-and-true songwriting that draws from contemporary folk, acoustic country and intimate chamber pop. Apart from one cover, a lovely, mini-orchestrated version of Cake's "Mexico" (featuring Emily DiAngelo on oboe and Elizabeth Means on cello), Odyssey features nine original songs all written and performed with a minimum of extraneous decoration and Mure's distinctive, sandy-textured vocals. One of our favorites is "Joanne 6," a softly-strummed song that reminds us of Nick Drake's sublime simplicity, string-backed arrangements and ethereal atmospherics." - Direct Current Music

Section 101, a New York based company that delivers a dynamic web-based solution providing simple and effective tools for music and entertainment brands will be supporting a show presented by the Jimmy Lloyd Songwriter Showcase on March 5th at 7pm at the Highline Ballroom in New York City.

Headlining the show is singer-songwriter-pianist Peter Cincotti. A native New Yorker who began playing piano at the age of three, this clear young talent started performing in clubs through out Manhattan while still in High School. The New York Times called Peter “one of the most promising singer-pianists of the next generation.” Peter’s musical styling blends pop, rock, blues and jazz. He is well known as one of the most skillful and insightful songwriters in the music industry today, which his latest album, Metropolis, is a testimony to. The Huffington Post calls the story of Metropolis, “a conceptual album, like a romance in the "modern" age.”

Jimmy Lloyd and Friends featuring Will de Zengotita and Emily Mure, and the Vanity Belles support Peter Cincotti at this show. Jimmy Lloyd & Friends is a Songwriter-in-the-Round format hosted by Jimmy, and featuring two other artists who have recently appeared on The Jimmy Lloyd Songwriter Showcase. The Vanity Belles is an up and coming ‘cosmo country’ duo that deliver a distinctive hybrid of country and rock n’ roll. They are currently readying their first full-length album to complement their well-received three-song EP released in May, 2011. - Section 101

ALLENTOWN, Pa. -
Part singer/songwriter and part instrumental arranger, Emily Mure, from New York City, combines the traditional craft of folk song with compositions featuring the oboe and cello.

You may have heard her at Musikfest this year, and she was kind enough to pay the Lehigh Valley another visit to join us for Music Monday. - WFMZ Allentown, PA

..."Clearly a good singer with a uniquely admirable consistency in her lyrical abilities, Emily’s songs and performance last week seemed to shun a stifling “hipsteresqe” genre or style, so too often the norm, and exuded a refreshingly traditional focus on songcraft. Emily’s influences are the most lyrically-driven geniuses of our time, and she’s learned very well to tell her stories, or paint her verbal pictures without forcing the words to the melody for the passive listener. Thank you for that." -Jezebel Music 1/9/08 - Jezebel Music

(PITTSFIELD, Mass.) – New York City-born singer/songwriter and instrumental arranger Emily Mure performs at Mission Bar + Tapas on Friday, February 24, 2012, at 9 p.m., as part of the 10×10 on North Festival in downtown Pittsfield. Mure’s original songs in the Americana style are strongly influenced by Irish fiddle tunes, bluegrass, and country music, and her organic, twangy vocals recall Emmylou Harris, Natalia Zukerman and Lucy Kaplansky.

Mure’s first musical performance was playing backup cowbell at age 8 on a float with Dr. Ruth while her father played drums. Emily wanted to learn about life outside the cowbell and took up oboe at age 11. She studied classical oboe at LaGuardia High School for the Performing Arts in Manhattan and later at Ithaca College. Feeling limited by the classical world of music, Mure got her first guitar at Ithaca and immediately started writing folk and bluegrass songs.

During the summer before her junior year of college, Mure studied Irish Celtic music at the University of Limerick in Ireland. She learned traditional Irish fiddle tunes on oboe and studied Celtic voice and guitar. Mure fell in love with Ireland and moved there after she graduated. For six months, she challenged her fear of performance and earned her living by playing music on the streets of Galway. After a time, her longing for home brought her back to New York City. In December 2009, she recorded her first album, Where I Began.


Emily Mure performing at the Living Room in New York
Emily Mure performs solo, with a trio (including oboe and cello), and with a full band. In New York City, she plays venues including Rockwood Music Hall, the Living Room, Bar 4, and Café Vivaldi. She has also developed a love for the Berkshires and has started to perform frequently around the area. She was an emerging artist at the Falcon Ridge Folk Festival in 2008. She has also played at the Lion’s Den in Stockbridge as well as at the Gypsy Joynt and Club Helsinki in Great Barrington. She has opened for well-known bluegrass groups and singer/songwriters including the Duhks at the Iron Horse Music Hall in Northampton and Kris Delmhorst in Brattleboro, Vt.

Songs from Where I Began have received radio airplay on stations including Women of Substance Radio and WMNF 88.5FM in Tampa. In 2011, Mure won Best Vocalist of the month on Singer Universe Magazine. Four of her songs were featured in a PBS Thanksgiving special in November 2011.

Where I Began features songs Emily wrote in college and while living in Ireland. This collection of stories about travel and lost love incorporate classical instruments into a folk-songwriter style. - The Rogovoy Report (Seth Rogovoy)

NEW YORK, NY — On November 6th, The Jimmy Lloyd Songwriter Showcase and Planet LA Records hosted an event at The Gibson/Baldwin Showroom in New York City to bring attention to missing and exploited persons in the United States. The afternoon concert brought New York area songwriters out to perform as part of the New York leg of "The Squeaky Wheel Tour" which ties in the songwriter community to the movement to find missing persons.

Ed and Elizabeth Smart were on hand to lend their support and Good Morning America filmed the event to be incorporated into a forthcoming segment on the long-running ABC morning show.

"Awareness makes all the difference in helping to find the missing and events like this really help to generate that awareness," said Ed Smart.
Local press and representatives from EMI were also in attendance to watch as accomplished songwriters including Emanuel Ayvas, Dorie Colangelo, Emily Mure and Jimmy Lloyd performed in between speakers who addressed the audience to talk about the many missing and exploited persons in the US who are never located and its ripple effects on the families and communities of the missing. Elizabeth and Ed Smart spoke specifically about abduction prevention education for children.
"The Squeaky Wheel Tour" is a captivating experience, it moves you in ways very few shows can. In between sets, there is almost an unspoken moment of silence between the performer and audience members. It is in those moments that respect is paid to those who are missing and the loved ones affected," said Aurora Pfeiffer, an A&R rep from EMI who was in attendance.

The eclectic line up of performers was assembled by Jimmy Lloyd, who produces and hosts the NBC syndicated TV program The Jimmy Lloyd Songwriter Showcase, which spotlights up-and-coming songwriters. "I think those of us fortunate to have media access should do whatever we can to help bring attention to the cause of missing and exploited persons and we are so thrilled to be involved in this special day," said Lloyd who was asked by the tour's organizer, Jannel Rap, to help with the New York City event.

"The Squeaky Wheel Tour" is a program of 411gina.org, which has a mission to gain media exposure for missing persons and help bring them home. It was started by Jannel Rap, whose sister Gina, a songwriter, went missing after a performance in Lincoln, Nebraska in 2000 and was never found. - MSNBC (The Jimmy Lloyd Songwriter's Showcase)

Hannah Fairchild, Emily Mure and Jodi Shaw are among the 12 NYC artists performing on the first night of the four-night-long, Deli sponsored 6th Annual LC Fest, organized by independent music community Local Correspondents at Bar4 in Park Slope, Brooklyn (444 7th Ave.).
Hannah Fairchild is an energetic singer who fronts the punk cabaret band Hannah vs. The Many, while Emily Mure is a classically trained, smoky-voiced singer/songwriter currently recording her second album (pictured, check out hes song Joanne, streaming below). Jodi Shaw, whose new album, “In Waterland,” was just released on May 15, draws comparisons to Suzanne Vega, Fiona Apple, and The Beach Boys. - The Deli

FAIRFIELD -- Singer and songwriter Emily Mure has spent most of her musical career playing on the streets of Galway, Ireland, and the stages of New York City's Lower East Side.

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New York singer and songwriter Emily Mure is playing a Valentine's Day concert Thursday at the Maine Academy of Natural Sciences charter school in Fairfield.
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Thursday night she will make her first trip to Maine to play a show at the Bishop Auditorium on the Good Will-Hinckley campus, with proceeds from the show going to the art and music program at the Maine Academy of Natural Sciences.

While she is here, Mure also will teach a class on songwriting at the school and reunite with an old friend from New York, Mady Spiegel, who is an AmeriCorps volunteer at the charter school. Her show tonight is open to the public for an admission fee of $5.

"I've never been to Maine, so I don't really know what to expect. The idea originally came from Mady, and I thought it was a good idea to play and also have some time to teach music," said Mure, who is 28 and lives on Roosevelt Island in New York.

The two women are friends who attended LaGuardia High School, a specialized high school for music and the arts and one of New York's most prestigious public schools. They also both lived in Ireland after graduation from college. In New York, Mure has played at Rockwood Music Hall, which typically books 10 to 15 live acts every night between its two stages, and the Living Room on the Lower East Side, both popular spots in a nightlife-dense neighborhood. She also has played at the Falcon Ridge Folk Festival in the Berkshires and the Iron Horse Music Hall in Northampton, Mass.

A classically trained oboist who studied at Ithaca College in western New York, Mure writes her own music and has released one album, "Where I Began," which came out in 2009. She said the music has undertones of her classical training mixed with inspiration that she draws from contemporary folk and bluegrass music. Among her favorite artists are the Lumineers, Bob Dylan, Feist and Andrew Bird.

"I really wanted her to come up here and play. The kids have been helping out with the concert, and I think it will be cool for them to see what she does," Spiegel said.

Those who bring an item of canned food to donate to the Fairfield Interfaith Food Pantry can pay $4 for admission to tonight's concert instead of $5.

The Maine Academy of Natural Sciences, which opened as a charter school in October, emphasizes the sciences and sustainable living as core to its curriculum. Spiegel said many students on campus also are interested in developing an arts and music program.

Last month they organized the first on-campus coffeehouse, an evening showcase of student work in the performing arts.

Mure, who attended a specialized high school for music in New York, said that starting a grass-roots community around music could help the school to grow.

"My advice to students would be that if there is something they want to get done, like starting an arts program, they should start their own community around it. They should have workshops and just play music with their friends," she said.

The concert begins at 7 p.m. Thursday at the Bishop Auditorium in the Prescott building on the Good Will Hinckley campus. Admission is five dollars or four dollars with the donation of a canned good for the Interfaith Food Pantry in Fairfield. - Morning Sentinel (Rachel Ohm)

“It’s hard to call Emily Mure anything but honest. The NYC-bred musician, who built up her solo chops busking in Ireland, creates pure and soulful music. Close your eyes listening to any of her songs and you’ll swear Norah Jones has a folk-singing sister. Looking to cry tears of tenderness? Turn up the volume on “Chocolate Milk," a song written for her grandmother, whose last words were, “I want chocolate milk and I want it now.” - BeaconPass (Ashley Peter)

"a smoky-voiced successor to Emmylou Harris and John Wesley Harding-era Dylan" - BeaconPass (James Rickman)

Emily Mure, a promising folk/pop singer & songwriter based in New York City, has won the February SingerUniverse “Best Vocalist Of The Month” Competition, for her performance of her song “Don't Lock The Front Door.” This song is included on her 12-song debut album Where I Began, which she released independently in December 2009.

“Don't Lock The Front Door” is an appealing folk/pop tune which has a very sparse instumentation--just vocals and acoustic guitar. But it provides a fine showcase for Mure's expressive, graceful vocal performance, which is reminiscent of Norah Jones' style. Notably, Mure played guitar and also produced this song, which was recorded by Mike Presta at The Engine Room studio in Manhattan.

Mure grew up on Roosevelt Island (which is part of Manhattan), and her grandfather and father were both professional musicians who introduced her to music. She was also inspired by listening to such favorite artists as Leonard Cohen, Bob Dylan and Ani DeFranco. Interestingly, the first instrument Mure learned was oboe, and she studied oboe while attending the LaGuardia High School for the Performing Arts. Impressively, during her high school period she performed with a woodwind quintet at Avery Fisher Hall, and with an orchestra at Carnegie Hall.


Emily Mure performing live.
For college, Mure attended Ithaca College (in central NY state), where she majored in Music and minored in Psychology. However, it was during college that she decided to focus on folk and Celtic music instead of classical. In the summer following her sophomore year, Mure studied Irish Celtic music at the University of Limerick in Ireland. In fact, she loved Ireland so much that after graduating from college, she moved to Galway, Ireland for six months, where she earned her living as a street musician. Also during this time in Ireland, she wrote several of the songs which would appear on her debut album, Where I Began.

Upon her return to New York in 2007, Mure performed live steadily (at such venues as Rockwood Music Hall, The Living Room, Union Hall and Arlene's Grocery), and she prepared to record her album, for which she wrote all the songs. "I started to record the album in May 2009, and it was recorded over the next few months," Mure recalled. "It was released that December (2009)."

Following the album's release, Mure has promoted the album online, and by playing many shows around New York, sometimes as a solo performer, in a trio (with oboe & cello), or with a full band. "I'm continuing to promote my album, playing local gigs and several festivals," she said. "I would also like to do a Northeast tour, and a Southern tour." In addition, Mure has been writing songs for her next album, which she will start recording later this year. - SingerUniverse

“Where I Began” is a simply beautiful debut album. The combination of a hauntingly mature voice and deep sophisticated lyrics from such a young artist. Mure has produced an album that feels like it’s been in my catalog for many years. A truly potent singer/songwriter. - Lee Scarfstein of Avrett Free & Ginsberg

"Here is a singer songwriter worth checking out. She is NYC born musician, who has already made a name for herself in Ireland and is now back to take on her native city. She writes brilliantly thought provoking folk music accompanied with a voice that is so rich and poignant that it hurts the heart. She an absolutely brilliant musicians that will be gathering buzz over the next couple of months that could definitely break her in to the NYC mainstream. Check her out before she hits it big." -What's Up! NYC 2/13/08 - whatsup!nyc