Beth Patterson is an Irish folk and Celtic musician.[1] Combining traditional Irish, Celtic and folk ballads with Cajun, world-beat and progressive rock influences, her own creative songwriting and a unique sense of humor, Patterson's wit, charm, and beauty are as memorable as her powerful music.
A native of Lafayette, Louisiana, Patterson began her professional career in her teens as a classical oboist and a Cajun bass player. She spent a year studying traditional Irish music and ethnomusicology at University College Cork in Ireland, where she began to experiment with musical fusion. She later finished her bachelor's degree in Music Therapy from Loyola University New Orleans. Today her preferred instrument is the Irish bouzouki, a tear-shaped eight-string instrument of Greek origin that became popular in Irish music in the 1960s. She plays a 10-string version as well.
She was a founding member of the ensemble The Poor Clares, who debuted at the New Orleans Jazz Festival to rave reviews. The Poor Clares' albums include Change of Habit and Songs for Midwinter, distributed nationally on the Centaur label. Since then, Patterson has released four albums, on the Little Blue Men Records label, include two studio productions, the somewhat more traditionally-oriented but still musically eclectic Hybrid Vigor, the world-beat and progressive-rock-influenced Take Some Fire, and the 2005 live album, Caught in the Act. Her new 2009 release, On Better Paths, is the most daring, crossing boundaries of form and genre even further. The recording received a Grammy nomination for Best Contemporary Folk Album. She has also played on and produced other albums, most recently (2005) on the album Orin by the Breton progressive-folk group Tornaod. She has over 90 recordings to her credit.
She was a regular performer at O'Flaherty's Irish Pub in New Orleans's famed French Quarter, until Hurricane Katrina hit at the end of August 2005; O'Flaherty's has not reopened at its original site, and at last report will not reopen in the future, but Patterson has since begun playing regularly at other New Orleans venues, particularly Cafe Negril on Frenchmen Street, and Carrollton Station in the Riverbend on Willow Street. She has also toured in Canada, France, Germany, Ireland and Belgium, as well as much of the United States. She is especially a favorite of Celtic music fans in the Washington, D.C. area.
In addition to her solo pursuits, Beth has also returned to the bass. She has been performing regularly with New Orleans-based John Lisi & Delta Funk, in which her fiance, CJ Solomon, plays drums. Patterson and Solomon also have a new band, Potent Bathers. They're writing together and play most of the instruments on a 2010 five-song release, EP ominous!, produced by Solomon. The project is adult contemporary pop drawing from different genres, very different from Beth's solo work.
Beth was mentioned in the novel Dragons Wild (both thanked as a test reader and mentioned briefly in the plot) by late sci-fi/fantasy author Robert Asprin.
Film credits include the motion pictures Lucinda's Spell, The One-Eyed King (starring William Baldwin and Armand Assante), and most recently Mike Judge's Extract (on Mirimax), starring Jason Bateman, Mila Kunis, and Ben Affleck.
Beth Patterson endorses Infiniti Oboe Reeds and the Ebow.