First brought together by Brooklyn’s tight-knit old-time music community in 2017, Nora Brown and Stephanie Coleman share a rich musical partnership that belies their 20 year age difference.
Nora plays banjo and guitar and has released 3 albums on Brooklyn-based Jalopy Records. She has performed across the US, Europe, and Japan including NPR’s Tiny Desk and TED EDU. With a dedication to the regional styles of banjo playing from eastern Kentucky and Tennessee, Nora has travelled and learned from master musicians and folklorists, including Alice Gerrard, George Gibson, John Haywood and the late Lee Sexton and Art Rosenbaum.
Over the past two decades, Stephanie has established herself as a highly respected and sought-after practitioner of traditional Appalachian and Midwestern-style old-time fiddle. She holds the record for most ribbons won in the renowned fiddle contest at the Appalachian String Band Music Festival in Clifftop, WV, and has recorded and toured internationally with artists such as trailblazing all-women stringband Uncle Earl, Watchhouse’s Andrew Marlin, singer-songwriter Aoife O’Donovan, and clawhammer banjo virtuoso Adam Hurt.
Nora and Stephanie recorded together on Nora’s debut album Cinnamon Tree and have performed as a duo at renowned festivals across America.
Still in her teens, Nora Brown started learning music at the age of 6 and plays and sings traditional music with a focus on Southern Appalachian banjo and guitar styles.
She has played numerous venues and festivals in the US and Europe including the Newport Folk Festival, the Philadelphia Folk Festival, the Trans-Pecos Festival of Love in Marfa Texas, and Folk Holidays in the Czech Republic. She has performed on NPR’s Tiny Desk, TED Salon and WNYC’s Dolly Parton’s America Podcast.
Since 2019 she has released 3 albums on Brooklyn’s own Jalopy Records, all of which have charted on the Billboard Bluegrass Charts during the first week of release.
The New Yorker called her most recent record Long Time To Be Gone “a disarming collection of traditional laments and exquisite banjo instrumentals” while Fretboard Journal described her 2nd album Sidetrack My Engine as “some of the most interesting and haunting traditional music we’ve heard…impossibly talented”.
“A reverent nod to deeply-rooted ole-time traditions, and an exhibit of sonic heirlooms carefully amended to meet a modern moment with vintage elegance” American Songwriter
“A wonderful night across the two full sets, it flew by so quickly it seemed all too brief – but who would not ask for more when the music is this good?” Americana UK
