Gayla Drake Paul - ProfilesArchive

About Me

Gayla Drake Paul is a force in songwriting and guitar performance. With 15 CDs to her credit, she is an artist who has made major contributions to her field. (See www.digitaldreamdoor.com, which ranks her as one of the top 100 acoustic guitarists on the planet, and also recommends her solo guitar CD in their top 10 Suggested Listening for Acoustic Guitar, and recently chose Broken Blues as one of the top 100 acoustic CDs of all time). A rarity beyond her achievements as an instrumentalist, she is also regarded as one of the finest songwriters of her generation, with an intimate and evocative voice.She is a frequent contributor to the fastest growing guitar magazine in the country, Premier Guitar, and is in their Top 10 articles downloaded list every single month. She has authored the revolutionaly Accelerated Guitar Method; Book 1 is currently available from CDBaby, and Book 2 is in the publication process. Internationally acclaimed filmmaker Francesco Paladino asked her to score a short film, Bluesblood and Mud Flowers, which led to an additional collaboration, The Iowa Stories, which won a Gold Remy at the Houston WorldFest International Film Festival in 2007 and has recently been released for European distribution. Francesco will return to the US in July 2008 for another collaboration about the Mississippi River. She was featured in the September/October 2006 issue of Flatpicking Guitar Magazine as one of the premier women flatpicking guitarists working today.In 2003 after a decade of intensely hard work with 10 internationally released and acclaimed CDs , a shoulder injury made it impossible for her to play. Soon afterward she was diagnosed with cancer, and spent 2004 recovering from both. She continued to compose, and produced a film score for a National Forestry Service DVD, taught numerous songwriting and guitar clinics, and continued to host the Iowa Guitar Summit series. In 2005 she released 4 new CDs, and re-recorded and re-mastered two that had gone out of print. In May of 2006, she released Here in the Center of the World with drummer and percussionist Eric Douglas.In May of 2007 she released the long awaited song-cycle The Wheel, a journey through a year of solar holidays. In January 2008 she released "Pour Me," another solo effort with 10 new songs. She's currently working on additional guitar instruction books and composing music on a John Dick Double Forte nylon string guitar for a new CD project.

My Interests

Music:

Member Since: 15/06/2007
Band Website: http://www.skep.com/gdpaul
Band Members: Gayla Drake Paul - guitar, vocals
Influences: Pierre Bensusan, Donal Lunny, Richard Leo Johnson, Michael Hedges, Stephen Fearing, BeJae Fleming, Laurence Juber, Micheal O'Domhnaill, Dan Crary, Doc Watson, Dick Gaughin, John Renbourne...
Sounds Like: Everybody has their own opinion, but we've collected the following in the wild: Joni; Ani; Nora; Pierre; but the personal favorite is from Chad Haatvedt at Folk City - "She makes a guitar sound like nobody else."
Record Label: Ivanhoe Road Music
Type of Label: Indie

My Blog

Time eaters

So I'm told by like 6 people that in order to really do this online music marketing thing, you have to be on both facebook AND myspace - so I am now on both. And I find it perfectly diabolical. If I w...
Posted by on Sat, 03 Jan 2009 06:59:00 GMT

Gig tonight

I have a gig tonight, but doesn't everybody? Yikes, there's a LOT of competition...Michael Johnson and Prudence Johnson (no relation) are in Marion at the Campbell Steele Gallery...there's another Tri...
Posted by on Sat, 06 Dec 2008 12:43:00 GMT

More on rewiring...

Doug and Heather have both weighed in on this - it's so interesting to me and the other interesting thing about making the transition from paper to electronic creativity, is that I can now write songs...
Posted by on Mon, 24 Nov 2008 17:50:00 GMT

Rewiring

OK, this is SO strange...I can no longer write songs on paper. Can't do it. My brain has been completely rewired so I now think in keyboard...there used to be something so satisfying about the feel of...
Posted by on Sat, 22 Nov 2008 08:30:00 GMT

More from Bob Long...

So, Bob Long and I have been chatting, and he's sent me some pictures of woods and other guitars he's made...I call it "guitar porn." I swear I'm the only person in the world who thinks sawdust is an ...
Posted by on Thu, 13 Nov 2008 17:34:00 GMT

The ugliest time of the year...

It's been raining for 3 days now with more to come - turning to snow over the weekend in fact...we're clammy and tired and everybody wants to hibernate. The perfect gorgeous days of fall are long gone...
Posted by on Thu, 13 Nov 2008 05:16:00 GMT

Bob Long Guitars

My dear friend Bart Bock turned 40 yesterday, and had a music festival to celebrate. He asked me if I'd play and I said of course, especially when I learned it was at the GENERAL STORE in Stone City I...
Posted by on Sun, 09 Nov 2008 09:50:00 GMT

It always works...

When in doubt, try a new guitar...or in my case, play an old guitar you haven't picked up in a couple years...yes, the Parker Fly did it, I got the words to one of the songs I've been fighting with af...
Posted by on Fri, 07 Nov 2008 14:58:00 GMT

RIP John Pearse

I learned yesterday of the passing of a good friend, a great musician and an inspiration to millions of players around the world. The great John Pearse has passed on...go to www.jpstrings.com to view ...
Posted by on Sat, 01 Nov 2008 04:57:00 GMT

Another new toy

So, yes, Virginia, the Voyage-Air Guitars totally rock. I know you've seen the ads in the magazines, and you're thinking, that's gotta be a cheesy piece of smeg, but no, it's really quite amazing. It'...
Posted by on Fri, 24 Oct 2008 10:41:00 GMT