Ellis Paul

Composers Now Week

Ellis Paul is one of the leading voices in American songwriting. He was a principal 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 urban, literate, folk pop style that helped renew interest in the genre in the 1990’s.

His charismatic, personally authentic performance style has influenced a generation of artists away from the artifice of pop and toward the realness of folk. Though he remains among the most pop-friendly of today’s singer-songwriters – his songs regularly appear in hit movie and TV soundtracks – he has bridged the gulf between the modern folk sound and the populist traditions of Woody Guthrie and Pete Seeger more successfully than perhaps any of his songwriting peers.