Biography

Rebecca Frazier’s lifelong journey between mountains and coastal waters is the backdrop for her flagship album, BOARDING WINDOWS IN PARADISE, a tour de force of bluegrass and acoustic roots music which celebrates the here and now. Frazier’s compelling original songs range from hard driving to thoughtful emotive folk, and her bluegrass interpretations of diverse classics from Madonna to Uncle Dave Macon fill out the album in a fine-tuned way that only experienced musicians can deliver. A bevy of acoustic A-listers such as Béla Fleck (banjo), Sam Bush (mandolin), and Stuart Duncan (fiddle) flavor her music with the wisdom and grace she was striving to present as she captured life’s juxtapositions with her new music.

Intention in the present moment inspired each new song, and the results are dynamic and uplifting. Frazier invokes majestic Rocky Mountain scenery and relishes living in “this moment here right now” (“High Country Road Trip”) and conveys moonlit anticipation and high-spirited mirth while celebrating the here-and-now (“Make Hay While the Moon Shines”). She urges listeners to step into the present (“Train Is Moving”) and gives a nod to traditional pleasure-seekers from a bygone era (“Saro Jane”). Cheerfulness and lighthearted diversion are noted (“Cantie Reel,” “Available”) in contrast to the intensity of love forsaken (“Seasons”) love maintained (“Hurricanes”), and love taken to the edge in Frazier’s eclectic acoustic cover of Madonna’s ‘80s classic, “Borderline.”

Frazier’s bond with GRAMMY-winning producer Bill Wolf, known for working with Tony Rice and Grateful Dead, was the catalyst for the significant caliber of musicianship on the album. Frazier collaborated with bluegrass icons Béla Fleck, Sam Bush, Stuart Duncan, Josh Swift, Barry Bales, Ron Block, and Byron House, as well as heavy hitters Trey Hensley, Love Canon, and Shelby Means to create an album of sheer originality while giving a reverent nod to those who’ve inspired her. Frazier’s unique flatpicking featured in each track creates the driving instrumentation for which she has been known for decades, while she adds her clawhammer banjo styling on “Saro Jane.” All tracks were recorded by Bill Wolf at his Studio W and Studio J in Alexandria, Virginia and FirePlace Studio in Nashville, TN, with additional recording by Matt Legge at Parlor Studio, Brent Truitt at the Cave, and Daniel Rice at Sweetbriar Studio, all in Nashville, and Stewart Myer at White Star Studio In Charlottesville, Virginia.

A bluegrass luminary herself, Frazier gained notoriety as the first woman to grace the cover of Flatpicking Guitar Magazine. In 2018, the Virginia native also became the first woman to earn a Guitar Performer of the Year nomination from the Society for the Preservation of Bluegrass Music of America, an honor she received again in 2019. Frazier is widely known for her work with Colorado-based outfit Hit & Run, the only band to score the bluegrass-world trifecta of winning Rockygrass, Telluride and SPBGMA festival band competitions. A single mom of two teens, Frazier continues to divide her time between Nashville and Virginia. Like generations of her ancestors who have lived along Virginia’s coast, she, too, has weathered life’s hurricanes and battering winds — and witnessed its luminous beauty — and she wanted to capture that juxtaposition on this record.