This post is part of our occasional feature, Songwriter Profiles. If you have a suggestion for a bluegrass songwriter we might want to consider, please contact us.

Louisa Branscomb is an acclaimed songwriter and pioneer in bluegrass music, having been referred to by Lance LeRoy, Lester Flatt’s manager, as “always 20 years ahead of her time.” A short list of her current accomplishments includes 4 songs on Dale Ann Bradley’s new release, Don’t Turn Your Back, including the title cut, having penned Alison Krauss’s breakout hit, Steel Rails, which still holds the honor of the longest running chart hit in bluegrass music, songs on Grammy’s by John Denver and Alison, approximately 85 songs recorded in bluegrass, and winning songs in songwriting contests that span decades. In addition, Louisa has a long career as a performer on guitar and banjo herself.

The International Bluegrass Music Awards have seen Louisa win honors on two recorded events of the year, including a project by Mark Newton celebrating women in bluegrass, and a song on the first Daughters of Bluegrass Recorded Event of the Year. Steel Rails, which received SPBGMA Song of the Year when released by Alison Krauss, is often credited with bringing a generation of young women into bluegrass music. At the present moment, her Dale Ann cut Don’t Turn Your Back is climbing bluegrass and roots charts, and Dale Ann’s CD by the same name is also climbing the charts, earning the #3 slot, so far, on Bluegrass Music Profiles.

Songwriting came early to Ms. Branscomb. Her parents recall her creating melodies on the piano at the age of four, and Louisa says that the first song she clearly remembers writing was at age six while at a Methodist summer camp in Alabama.

“It was a love song with one verse. Shows what I knew!”

At the age of 11 she won first place in the Alabama Student Music Composition Contest and performed with the Birmingham Symphony before an audience of 2000.

A country-music singing cousin in Texas gave Louisa her first guitar, a Martin 00-21.

“Ben was the real deal. He brought me into the real country music–Lefty Frizzell, Hank Snow, and Merle Haggard. From then on, folk and classical music took second place and bluegrass and country ruled.”

Sally Wingate, a banjo playing friend in college began playing with Louisa, and the two moved to Winston-Salem, where, at the age of 21, they co-founded the first, or one of the first modern all-female bluegrass bands, Bluegrass Liberation. (more…)

Songwriter Louisa Branscomb’s name is a familiar one in bluegrass circles. As a songwriter, she holds the record for the longest consecutive run on the Bluegrass Unlimited singles chart for the Alison Krauss recording of Steel Rails.

Louisa has a track (Fools Gold) on Back To The Well, the IBMA’s Recorded Event Of The Year for 2006, and has had her songs recorded by many other artists in recent years.

She has also been a contributing writer for Bluegrass Unlimited magazine, and has been an active member of the International Bluegrass Music Association for some time. Though she spent many years performing, Louisa is no longer a full time music professional, and is a clinical psychologist in her “real life.”

A special honor came her way just recently with an induction into the Atlanta Country Music Hall of Fame. We caught up with Louisa and she shared some thoughts on this distinction, and on songwriting.

It’s a real honor to be inducted into the Hall of Honor of the Atlanta Country Music Hall of Fame, along with some of my long-time friends in the bluegrass/country community in Georgia. The Hall of Honor requires a 25 year commitment and contribution to music in Georgia, and includes friends Mindy Rakestraw and Frances Mooney (Daughters of Bluegrass and co-band members of mine as far back as 1979).

The Hall of Fame “proper” houses many first generation country stars whose names are familiar to all, such as Gid Tanner and the Skillet Lickers, Vern Gosdin, Felice and Boudleaux Bryant, and Johnny Paycheck, along with poeple who have made a lasting contribution to bluegrass in Georgia such as J.N. and Oni Baxter and Mike Fleming, who has done so much for IBMA. A special treat this year was the induction of Terri Gibbs to the Hall of Fame. I was influenced by Terri’s song, “Somebody’s Knockin’,” in the 70’s, when I fell in love with country music–the creative songwriting–changing from majors to minors, the challenging message of the song.

I think when people think of country music, they think of Tennessee. (more…)