Libby Roderick
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Libby is an internationally acclaimed singer/songwriter, poet, activist, teacher and lifelong Alaskan. The surprising power and depth of her music and the humor and spontaneity of her performances have attracted large and enthusiastic audiences across the continent and fans all over the world. Her six recordings have received extensive airplay on Earth and, in 2003, NASA played her song “Dig Down Deep” on the planet Mars as encouragement to the robot “Spirit.”
In 2002, Libby sang an invocation for Coretta Scott King at a conference in Washington, D.C. In August 2005, CNN did a special on Libby and the worldwide healing impact of her song “How Could Anyone” and in September 2005, the Associated Press released an article on the global reach of the folk anthem that was picked up by media outlets ranging from the New York Times to ABC News to the Hindustani Times. "How Could Anyone," has been translated into several languages, recorded by many artists and reprinted in many books (including Hometown by Pulitzer-prize winner Tracy Kidder). It was sung by thousands at the U.N. Conference in Beijing in 1995. This September, Libby was featured with Walter Cronkite and Judy Collins at a national conference for a U.S. Department of Peace in D.C., as well as at the World Wilderness Congress, an international gathering to preserve wild places around the globe. In October, the Alaska Legislature honored her art and activism with a citation of excellence.
The premiere national U.S. folk magazine, Dirty Linen, calls Libby "one of the most compassionate and caring songwriters recording today," and the Worcester Massachusetts Telegraph said Libby "may be the folk music find of the decade!" Australia's Rhythms music magazine calls Libby "a singer-songwriter of compassion and insight" and Ladyslipper Distribution describes her as "original, introspective, poetic, articulate, politically conscious and spiritually inspired."
Libby is well-known as an exhilarating and witty artist who offers a remarkable blend of passionate music, wry humor and incisive commentary on social and personal issues. In 1998, Libby was named a finalist for the coveted national Green Dove Award which honors people whose work links creativity, psychology and ecology, and for the Alaska Woman of Achievement Award for contributions to her home state. She is one of 225 world citizens (including the Dalai Lama, Nelson Mandela, Archbishop Desmond Tutu, Winona LaDuke, Ursula LeGuin and many others) whose writing was included in a book called Prayers for a Thosand Years: Inspiration from Leaders and Visionaries Around the World.
Libby's recordings have been enormously successful worldwide and her folk classic, "How Could Anyone," has been translated into several languages, recorded by many artists and reprinted in many books (including Hometown by Pulitzer-prize winner Tracy Kidder). It was sung by Hillary Clinton and thousands of others at the U.N. Conference in Beijing.
Along with Paul Winter, John McCutcheon, Lou and Peter Berryman and other artists, Libby donated a track to a recording entitled "One Land, One Heart" by Musicians United to Sustain the Earth to raise money for wilderness preservation in the U.S. She is also a faculty member of the Institute for Deep Ecology, along with internationally renowned activists and teachers Joanna Macy, David Abrams, John Seed and others. She conducts workshops on a range of topics for universities nationwide.
Libby was born and raised in Anchorage, Alaska where she still lives part of the time. She graduated summa cum laude from Yale University in American Studies, and has worked as a TV and print news reporter, radio consultant, nuclear weapons educator and writer on Alaska Native issues.
Included with permission of Lauren Bruce, Libby Roderick's manager at Turtle Island Records. www.libbyroderick.com
