Ellis Paul

It was while bedridden from a college track injury that Ellis Paul discovered songwriting, making up songs on a guitar a friend had given him to keep him from being so bored. By 1989 he was haunting the Boston open mic scene. 

He became a principle leader in the wave of singer/songwriters that emerged from the Boston Folk scene, creating a movement that revitalized the national acoustic circuit with an urbane, literate, folk pop style that helped renew interest in the genre in the 1990’s.

As early as 1993, the Boston Globe was calling Ellis a songwriter's songwriter, adding that "no emerging songwriter in recent memory has been more highly touted and respected by songwriters."  His infectious melodicism, literate lyrics, and honest performing style won him an unprecedented 13 Boston Globe music awards between 1993 and 2004.   He has this year been nominated for “Outstanding Folk Act” and “Outstanding Singer/Songwriter.”  The annual Boston Music Award ceremony will be held December 1, just prior to Ellis’s Norman visit.
 
Ellis has bridged the gulf between the modern folk sound and the populist traditions of Woody Guthrie and Pete Seeger perhaps more successfully than any of his songwriting peers.  Still, a huge respect for Woody Guthrie colors his music.  

Ellis describes Guthrie as “ground zero, the prototype in a long line of people I’m a huge fan of.”   In 1996, Woody’s daughter, Nora, invited Ellis to perform at a Woody Guthrie tribute show at the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in Cleveland, Ohio.  He also appeared with the all-star Guthrie tribute tour Ribbon of Highway, Endless Skyway and put music to Guthrie’s unpublished lyric, God’s Promise.  Ellis was made an honorary citizen of Okemah in 1998 in recognition of all he had done to revive interest in the dust bowl troubadour.     

A regular at the Woody Guthrie Folk Festival in Okemah, Ellis has developed a dedicated Oklahoma fan base to add to his huge mailing list of fiercely loyal fans across the nation and beyond.  Like Guthrie before him, Ellis displays a humble genius for putting the divisive issues of the day into starkly personal and emotional terms.

But Ellis is not a Guthrie clone.  Far from it. “Ellis was always unique," Bill Morrissey recalls. "He didn't write like anybody, didn't sing like anybody, didn't perform like anybody.  Ellis was always himself.”  His charismatic, personally authentic performance style has influenced a generation of artists away from the artifice of pop, and toward the realness of folk. 

Yet, Ellis is among the most mainstream-friendly of today’s singer/songwriters.  His songs appear regularly in commercials (locally, his song The World Ain’t Slowin’ Down was included in both television and radio commercials for the Oklahoma Blood Institute), TV soundtracks and in the soundtracks of the Farrelly Brothers films, including Me, Myself, & Irene, starring Jim Carrey, and Shallow Hal, with Jack Black and Gwyneth Paltro.  Director Peter Farrelly has called Ellis “a national treasure.” 

Another of his many loyal fans is Winter Wind Chair, Becky Grider. “Words that I would use to describe Ellis Paul could never come close to doing him justice,” she says.  “In my opinion, he's right up there at the top.  There's no one out there who can pull off a more spellbinding show with just himself and a guitar.  I am honored to have him perform in our series.”  

For more information, call The Performing Arts Studio at 405-307-9320.  For more information on Ellis Paul, visit http://www.ellispaul.com/.

PAS office hours are Tuesday through Friday from 8:00 am to 3:00 pm and on Sunday from 1:00 to 5:00.  Winter Wind Concerts are made possible in part by grants from the Norman Chamber of Commerce Arts and Humanities Committee, Norman Arts Council, the Oklahoma Arts Council and the National Endowment for the Arts.  Sponsors are: Tom McAuliffe, Don Cies Real Estate; Mark and Teresa Marsee, Avante Skin Care; and Nancy McClellan.  Additional support comes from Skye Diers, Gingerbread Nursery School; Becky Grider and Danna Primm.