WHIPPOORWILL ARTS FELLOWS
Nina Gerber
After carving a career out of what some might call the shadows, guitarist Nina Gerber is at last beginning to dare the light. Her first album as a leader, Not Before Noon, follows two decades which brought her to prominence without ever placing her name on the front of an album cover. Since her accompaniment of Kate Wolf first earned her recognition, her acute skills as performer, producer and arranger have continued to deepen. Her contributions to acoustic music have earned her a following as loyal as for the numerous high talents she has accompanied--proving the shadows equal to the spotlight in the creation of honest, powerful, and beautiful music.
Nina has a unique ability to completely free herself within an eclectic range of styles. Presented with folk, country, bluegrass, rock, or blues, she is able to fall into leads which have rare reverence for the true feeling of a song, always emphasizing taste over technical display. She seeks to express through her hands, rather than gain attention, and it is this integrity which makes her expressions worth intent listening.
That kind of intent listening will reveal Nina’s melodic touch in more places than many realize. Nina has performed and/or recorded with: Nanci Griffith, Greg Brown, Dave Alvin, Lucy Kaplansky, Mollie O’Brien, Karla Bonoff, Eliza Gilkyson, Laurie Lewis, Ferron, Rosalie Sorrels, Terry Garthwaite, Tom Paxton, and many others.
That qualities of honest heart inform Nina’s music should be of no surprise, given Kate Wolf’s initial influence and inspiration. It was Kate’s heart and honesty which inspired Nina to realize music as her calling. After seeing Kate perform in 1975 at a pizza parlor in Sebastopol, California--Nina’s home town--Nina dared to set working with Kate as a specific goal, and by 1978, the goal was accomplished. Nina came to be an essential part of Kate’s music, as she grew into being her accompanist and close musical companion. It was a partnership which lasted until Kate’s passing in 1986, and in its effect, has lasted long beyond that. It’s an achievement which is a testament to the power of clear desire and single-minded purpose; it’s also evidence of the daring Nina has shown throughout her career since, whether through seeking out the challenging rush of unrehearsed performances, driving her van alone cross-country (1985) to explore the music scenes of Austin and Nashville, taking a sabbatical to study at the Guitar Institute of Technology in Hollywood, or just keeping on as a musician in a country where artistic integrity rarely pays.
Whether it’s on her own “solo” CDs- collaborations with some of the folk world’s finest--or producing, arranging, or performing with countless others, Nina continues to prove with her guitar that some of the truest and most emotional communication requires no words. Still, when combined with the voice of another musician of heart, the result is affecting in an unforgettable way.
PROJECT: Record album in honor of loved ones passed on.
“It’s rather bittersweet that two of my best guitars came to me from my good friends who have died,” says Nina Gerber, favored accompanist to some of folk music’s most revered singer-songwriters. Her David Matlin acoustic was gifted to her by Kate Wolf just before she died. Nanci Griffith gave her a 1962 Reissue Fender Stratocaster after loaning it to Gerber while she sat in with the Blue Moon Orchestra. It’s fitting, then, that Gerber’s fourth solo CD is a heart-centered project inspired by and dedicated to some of her favorite songwriters – no longer living but nevertheless alive inside her own music. Time is Funny that Way was funded through a grant from Whippoorwill Arts, and in addition to a couple of original compositions, features seven songs by Kate Wolf, Nanci Griffith, Sarah Elizabeth Campbell, and Keith Allen.
Song List
Deep Water
Just Another Picker in the Band (featuring Laurie Lewis)
Tootsie's Lullaby
Time is Funny that Way (featuring Chris Webster)
The Car Song (featuring Pam Delgado)
Ford Econoline (featuring Peter Rowan)
Funky Alien
Winthrop Waltz
These Times We're Living In (featuring Chris Webster)
Ukrainian National Anthem / Get Together
“…the epitome of a perfect musician! It is so Zen the way she perfectly under-girds and complements whatever music is at hand, never playing an extraneous or superfluous or irrelevant note, & always being perfectly in the flow with whatever she is playing & whomever she’s playing with! Playing Music together on that level is Divine!… everything else is a more or less skillful filling the air with a more or less pleasant bunch of notes!
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“She’s a musician’s musician, or maybe she’s just everybody’s favorite guitarist.”
“Amongst acoustic guitarists, Gerber is held in near universal high regard, not least for how she distills strength from subtlety. Her melodic fretwork warmly complements and never overwhelms…”