Singer-songwriter Jamie Anderson hails from Ottawa, Ontario, except for the few months in winter when she hides out in Arizona. She has played her unique original songs in hundreds of venues in four countries, including forty-seven U.S. states. Proficient on guitar, ukulele, and mandolin, this musician with an expressive soprano is folk without the Birkenstocks, country without the big hair, and jazz without the weird chords. Her twelve recordings offer a variety of topics from body image (“Beautiful”) to wanting to marry Rachel Maddow because really, who wouldn’t?
In high school she played local coffeehouses and weddings. After the hundredth request for “Wedding Song,” she decided to write her own songs. Jamie did her first national tour in 1987 because she needed to earn gas money to get to a music festival. She’s been collecting tiny motel soaps ever since.
Jamie started releasing albums in the late eighties, selling thousands of albums at a time before YouTube and Spotify. She’s appeared at folk and women’s music festivals, coffeehouses, colleges, and pride events.
Her 2019 release, The Truth Appears, is a collection of seventeen originals, including “Between,” a poignant pop/folk song about the gray area between the lines of a relationship, and “A Very Sad Tail,” a dramatic piece co-written by her cat who threatened to shred the furniture if Jamie didn’t record it.
Her most recent recording is Songs from Home, written and recorded during the pandemic She initially intended to record one song, “Six Feet Away,” and ended up recording six. Because it wasn’t safe for a whole band in the studio, Jamie and James Stephens played all of the instruments.
Laughter is a big part of Jamie’s live performance. Her offbeat song intros and stories help keep the performance fun, but don’t be surprised when she delves into more serious issues. She’s emceed at many events, and she can hula hoop while playing the ukulele. When Jamie isn’t touring, she teaches music. Her popular YouTube channel has 73K subscribers, and one of her guitar instructional videos has gone viral, with over two million views.
Jamie’s also an author. Her memoir, Drive All Night, was published in 2014. Her second book, An Army of Lovers: Women’s Music of the Seventies and Eighties, came out in 2019. Her latest book, Drive All Day (Because I’m Too Old to Drive all Night), was released in 2022.
Awards include Best Jazz Song from RightOutTV (2014), the Jane Schliessman Award for Outstanding Contributions to Women’s Music (Women in the Arts, 2006), and others that only her mama cares about