Stefan Grossman

Guitarist, educator, and historian Stefan Grossman absorbed the techniques of acoustic blues and gospel performer Rev. Gary Davis through intensive weekend lessons that began at age fifteen. Those sessions, held at Davis’s Harlem residence, often stretched eight to ten hours and continued for eight years while Grossman attended high school and college. He later sought out additional country-blues masters, among them Mississippi John Hurt, Son House, Skip James, Mance Lipscomb, and Fred McDowell. Earlier stylistic models also encompassed Elizabeth Cotten, Sam McGee, Willie Brown, and Charley Patton.

During the early 1960s Grossman assembled the Even Dozen Jug Band and collaborated with the politically oriented rock group the Fugs, after which he relocated to Great Britain. In 1968 he established Kicking Mule Records alongside Ed Denson; the imprint specialized in distinctive acoustic blues and folk guitar approaches. Their partnership ended in the mid-1980s, yet Fantasy Records subsequently acquired the label’s catalog, allowing selected original vinyl recordings to reappear on compact disc. Between 1967 and the early 1980s Grossman resided in Great Britain, where he built a following on the European blues and folk festival circuit and performed alongside British-raised acoustic guitarists John Renbourn and John Fahey.

Grossman’s first solo album, How to Play Blues Guitar, appeared on Elektra Records in 1966. His broader session credits encompass work with the Even Dozen Jug Band—whose members later included John Sebastian, Maria Muldaur, and David Grisman—as well as contributions to projects by Paul Simon, John Fahey, Charlie Musselwhite, and Happy Traum. Beginning in the early 1980s he developed an extended association with Shanachie Records in Newton, New Jersey, issuing Shining Shadows (1988), Guitar Landscapes (1990), Love, Devils & the Blues (1992), Northern Skies, Southern Blues (1997), and Shake That Thing: Fingerpicking Country Blues (1998). He further assisted Shanachie in creating its Guitar Artistry imprint, which featured releases by Grossman, Renbourn, and Traum. While living in northwest New Jersey, Grossman limited touring and devoted primary attention to Vestapol, his instructional-video enterprise, which offered titles by artists ranging from Merle Travis and Chet Atkins to Dave Van Ronk and Brownie McGhee, many later converted to DVD.

Throughout the 2000s Grossman recorded in duo and trio formats, releasing Bermuda Triangle Exit with Tokio Uchida in 2007 and Played a Little Fiddle with Danny Kalb and Steve Katz; both appeared on his Guitar Workshop label, which also documented artists such as Davy Graham, Happy Traum, and David Laibman, along with archival and various-artist collections. In 2006 he resumed concert appearances across the United States, England, Europe, and Japan. Grossman continues to rank among the leading authorities on acoustic blues guitar.