Singer
Songwriter

Kate's Website

Having cut her teeth on bluegrass and Appalachian Mountain folk music and polished her rough edges with a classical music performance degree, twenty-four year old Colorado-based singer/songwriter Kate Laurel Smith brings a diverse musical background to the plate. She has musical experience most recently grounded in Classical French horn, but looks to a widely varied list of musical influences in every genre from Roots Rock and Roll to Jazz. Ben Folds, Over the Rhine, Natalie Merchant, Damien Rice, Elliott Smith and John Mayer are just a few of the folks who have frequented her ever-busy CD player in recent years.

Kate's variety of musical experiences began when she was a small child. Although she was born in Middlebury, Vermont, her parents shortly thereafter hit the road for a four year sight-seeing excursion around the continental U.S. in several mid-60's Volkswagen buses. Seasonal employment pit stops landed the crew in PA, NC, GA, TN, VA, ME, KS, WY, CO, MT, ID, UT, AZ, OK, TX and all across Canada. Kate's parents nurtured in her a love for live acoustic music; both played acoustic guitar and lap dulcimer. When they stopped traveling to settle down in the mountains of Colorado, the record player was up and running, spinning Doc Watson, the Red Clay Ramblers, Fleetwood Mac, Bob Dylan and Emmylou Harris to name a few. Later, with the addition of a new stepfather, Kate discovered her love for rock and roll with Led Zeppelin, Little Feat, Lynyrd Skynyrd, ZZ Top, the Who, Tom Petty and the Eagles. Live concerts and bluegrass festivals topped the list of vacation destinations, and there was always something playing in the car cassette player.

When she was old enough, Kate begged to take piano lessons. Several teachers and an inconsistent five years of study later, Kate slipped away from the classical discipline to play by ear. She continued her intellectual pursuit of music with the French horn, eventually majoring in music performance at Huntington College in Indiana. Four hard years of successful study left her feeling unfulfilled, however, and she didn't discover why until she started writing songs partway through her senior year of college. At the time, she was also singing backup vocals and playing keys for a coffee shop folk-rock trio that called themselves Alabaster. It was this involvement that re-sparked her passion for the folk music that had built her musical past and ignited a new zeal for the art of songcraft. Modeling much of her early song structure and piano style after the artists she admired most at the time, Ben Folds, Over the Rhine and Natalie Merchant, Kate started writing, and kept writing. After graduation, Kate picked up guitar and stayed in Ft. Wayne to play for a year. She decided to split from the group in January of 2004, and moved home to pursue a solo career.

August of 2004 saw the release of Kate's self-produced debut album, Sometimes, a homegrown diamond in the rough made up of musical snapshots from her first two years of writing. After a season of penning verses, practicing and home-recording in her mountain-town apartment, Kate packed up her life and moved to Denver in search of venues, fans, fellow musicians and the promise of the broader musical horizons of the city. Forty-some odd songs later, Kate has plans to release her sophomore album, Confessions, a collection of intimate songs written and recorded upon her arrival in Denver.

With these experiences and many others under her belt, Kate is on the verge of taking off. Her prolific songwriting, a soulful voice nearly matching her six-foot frame in size, a couple of Gibson guitars and equally smooth piano skills have launched Kate Laurel Smith onto the stage of the Roots/Americana/Folk/Alt. Country singer-songwriter music world.

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