Peter Mulvey

Peter Mulvey has been a songwriter, road-dog, raconteur, and almost-poet since before he can remember. In 1989 he spent a year in Ireland, busking on the streets of Dublin and hitchhiking to whatever gigs he could find. Back stateside, he spent a couple years gigging through the bars of his native Midwest before taking off for Boston, where he returned to subway busking and coffeehouses. Small shows led to larger shows, which eventually led to regional and then national touring. The wheels have not stopped since.

Twenty albums, one illustrated book, thousands of live performances, a TEDx talk, a decades-long association with the National Youth Science Camp, opening tours and gigs for luminaries such as Ani DiFranco, Greg Brown, Emmylou Harris and Chuck Prophet, appearances on NPR, an annual autumn tour by bicycle, emceeing festivals, hosting his own Lamplighter Sessions for years in Boston and in Wisconsin… he has built his life’s work on collaboration, on an instinct for the eclectic and the vital.

With his eighteenth record, “There Is Another World”, Mulvey delves into the winter of things. Divorce and death, loss and renewal are all present in a collection of songs that range from terse, haiku-like intensity to warm, evocative poetry. And the poets are littered throughout the record; references to Naomi Shihab Nye, Lorine Niedecker, Ted Kooser, Jim Harrison, Mary Oliver, Rilke, Yeats, and Beckett nestle alongside his musical influences of Greg Brown, Anais Mitchell, and Paul Simon.