The Makers

The Makers are Lydia Garrison and Nate Silas Richardson. A shared obsession with the music of Mali, West Africa brought them together, and a potent creative chemistry emerged between them. They blend their voices, fiddle, banjo, and various guitars into an intricate weave of sometimes unclassifiable but always heartfelt, roots-based original songs, exploring the triumphs and tragedies along life’s beautiful & bumpy road. 

Lydia grew up in the Old Time, Cajun, and Zydeco music worlds, dancing and jamming and feeling the music swirling around her at music festivals in the North East and Louisiana. She has been inspired by songwriters and musicians such as Bear Fox, Keith Frank, Courtney Granger, Lucinda Williams, Emmy Lou Harris, Ginny Hawker, Rokia and Boubocar Traoré, Zoumana Tereta, and Oumou Sangaré. She did a musical study abroad in Bamako, Mali, West Africa in 2008, seeing up close the power that she'd felt as an audience member at the local Finger Lakes GrassRoots Festival of Music & Dance, which routinely brought musical acts from Mali.

Nate is a musical omnivore and a lifetime learner, with over 3 decades of experience touring, recording, teaching, and speaking.  Guitar has been his passport to the world, from Kobuchizawa Japan, to Cape Breton Nova Scotia, and from Kailua Hawaii, to Gulu Uganda. He has performed key roles on records by 10ft Ganja Plant, Sim Redmond Band, John Brown’s Body, Samite, and many others.  Whether its on a festival stage, in the classroom, or working his day job as a producer at Rep Studio in Ithaca NY, Nate is always making connections and lifting spirits. 

Bring a receptive heart to a Makers show, and you'll dance, sing along, laugh and perhaps even shed a tear, all whilst being soothed by the intricate tones of these two multi-instrumentalists.

[Pictured in the small window-to-the-past on Lydia’s banjo is her maternal great-great-great grandfather, pride of the family, William Lloyd Garrison]