“I miss the sense of rootedness that old music brought to bear. The internet can be amazing for many things, including readyaccess to old recordings and otherwise lost forms of music.”

William Lee Ellis: American Roots Paths

William Lee Ellis is a roots music fingerpicking guitarist and songwriter who has been hailed a “wizard on steel strings” (Blues Revue) and “one of our finest contemporary songwriters” (Living Blues). He has released five albums on the Yellow Dog Records label, notably 2023’s Ghost Hymns – a Blues Music Awards nominee for Acoustic Blues Album of the Year – and he has backed his father, banjo/fiddle composer Tony Ellis, on numerous studio projects and in concert. William holds a PhD in ethnomusicology, has played Mountain Stage, MerleFest, and the Kennedy Center among other venues, and is a guitar-instructing alum of Jorma Kaukonen’s Fur Peace Ranch and Augusta Blues Week. He lives with his wife and daughter in Vermont, where he is Professor of Music at Saint Michael’s College.                              (Photo: William Lee Ellis,fingerpicking guitarist and songwriter)

Acclaimed acoustic performers Andy Cohen, Eleanor Ellis and William Lee Ellis return as a trio with the new album, “Whistlin’ Past The Graveyard” on March 20 2026. Released on Cohen’s Riverlark label, the ambitious project is a 21-track tour-de-force of old-time blues, gospel, ballads, ragtime, and country song that surpasses their previous high bar, the 1993 Marimac outing, Preachin’ in That Wilderness. The ambitious project is a 21-track tour-de-force of old-time blues, gospel, ballads, ragtime, and country song that surpasses their previous high bar, the 1993 Marimac outing, Preachin’ in That Wilderness. Produced by William Lee Ellis and River Hartley (Ghost Hymns), Whistlin’ is a truly unique listen, one that fits no single musical category; rather, it explores with finger-picked verve and joy the expansive palette of America’s musical past, still relevant and very much alive in the sound of this remarkable trio.

Interview by Michael Limnios      Special Thanks: Geraint & Deb Jones (G Promo PR)

How has music influenced your views of the world? What moment changed your musical life the most?

Music, especially folk music, has been everything to me. It has been my north star as a musician, as a scholar and academic, as a person finding one’s place in this world, as a marker of my identity and the opportunity to explore invention and reinvention. Time-honored blues and gospel songs notably remain a moral compass and have been a source of joy, compassion, and healing in my darkest times. Like I said, music is everything. I grew up in a music-making household – my father, Tony Ellis, played banjo for Bill Monroe (my godfather) – and so there was never a time when I didn’t see music as a way to bond with family, friends, and audiences alike or as a way to speak to life and the concerns of this world. One life-changing moment happened when I saw guitar picker nonpareil Andy Cohen perform decades ago when I was in undergraduate school studying classical guitar. Andy played several Rev. Gary Davis songs, including a raucous “Samson and Delilah,” and I was hooked. In that moment, I found a music that spoke to the true vine of tradition but also had all the demands and virtuosity of classical guitar. Little did I know but that concert was the beginning of a lifelong friendship with Andy, who still inspires me to this day.

What keeps a musician passionate over the years in Roots Music? What's the balance in music between technique (skills) and soul/emotions?

Technique is never an end unto itself but exists to capture the soul or spirit of a performance. To that point, the best performers make what they do seem easy, which is always the sign of a master. When you listen to B.B. King or Mahalia Jackson, for example, the work that went into finessing the musical note or phrase is never on display; instead, what one hears is the unfiltered emotion conveyed by command of their craft. As far as passion, what keeps me motivated year after year is the endless journey to better one’s mastery of an instrument and to find something new to say either in a song or the improvised moment. That never gets old.

“The DNA of blues is in just about everything at this point, including various global traditions. Personally, I adhere to a mode of thought that Black music, from spirituals to hip hop, has been one long song, a song of resistance, of aspiration, of validation.” (Andy Cohen, Eleanor Ellis and William Lee Ellis, noted artists in the folk and blues worlds / Photo by Jennifer Sirey)

You've an ambitious project with Andy Cohen and Eleanor Ellis. How did that idea come about? Do you have any interesting stories about the making of Whistlin' Past the Graveyard?

Andy, Eleanor, and I made a record of pre-war blues and gospel song for the Marimac label decades ago called Preachin’ in That Wilderness. We enjoyed that experience so much, we always intended to make a follow-up. It just happened to have taken 35 years! Now we are at or past the age of the musical heroes who have long inspired us, fabled musicians such as Rev. Gary Davis, Henry “Ragtime Texas” Thomas, and Washington Phillips. So consider this album old music made by old folks! We recorded it at a downtown studio in Burlington, Vermont, during a rather chilly November and put down 30 songs in five days, all the while poor Eleanor had walking pneumonia! But our wonderful engineer/producer, River Hartley kept the sessions on track and mixed the results – almost all first and second takes – with a warm immediacy that listeners will hopefully enjoy. Other than the four songs I composed for the project and Andy’s very funny original, “Chicken,” everything was culled from the past. Like much traditional song, the album’s subject matter includes all manner of vice and hard living from drinking and gambling to the opium trade and sundry reflections on death. Eleanor summed it up best when she looked at me and said, “Bill, what will people think of us?” As for the album’s title and imagery, consider it tongue-in-cheek with Rabelais-inspired art design reflecting the earthy and ribald nature of the music.

What do you miss most nowadays from the music of the past? What are your hopes and fears for the future of?                                     

I miss the sense of rootedness that old music brought to bear. The internet can be amazing for many things, including readyaccess to old recordings and otherwise lost forms of music. Too that end, YouTube, for example, boasts incredible musicianswho have taken technique to new levels of virtuosity and expressivity. But something is likely being lost in the paradigm that online music culture has fostered, namely the absence or even devaluing of learning and leaning in on music passed down from family, community and region. Those connections have long fostered stylistic and individual distinction and innovation (think, for example, the Bentonia, Mississippi school of blues guitar or slack key fingerstyle tradition of Hawaii), and I fear such distinctions are at risk of becoming homogenized and indistinguishable in our online environment. Another fear, of course, is the threat AI poses not so much to human creativity but to the acceptance of non-human creativity as something audiences will accept as a new norm. That and the ongoing inequities musicians face when being compensated for their creative contributions. Who can afford to be a working musician these days when royalties from streaming are pennies to the dollar?

“Technique is never an end unto itself but exists to capture the soul or spirit of a performance. To that point, the best performers make what they do seem easy, which is always the sign of a master.”

(Photo: William Lee Ellis)

Why do you think that Acoustic Roots music continues to generate such a devoted following?

Its authenticity. It embodies the very nature of music making that has always been an anecdote to whatever popular forms of music happen to rule the charts. It is hard to hide, after all, behind something so exposed and immediate as an unplugged, acoustic instrument. And the lyrics often reflect and explore the full experience of life beyond the staid sentiments of juvenile love that pass for so much pop music. Don’t get me wrong, there is much popular music I adore, but my heart often gravitates to the emotionally raw and real songs of prior generations of blues and gospel performers. No doubt someone as iconic as the great Bob Dylan would agree.

What is the impact of music on the socio-cultural implications? How do you want the music to affect people?

Well, that’s a question worthy of a book-long answer! I will simply say that music, while it may not always change the world, is incredibly effective at changing hearts and minds and sometimes moving the political temperature. Best is its ability to bear lasting witness to history; think the powerful songs of the Civil Rights Movement such as Nina Simone’s “Mississippi Goddam.” How I personally want my music to affect people is out of my control. I believe good art has the ability to deliver as many messages, feelings, and experiences as there are people in an audience. If someone is moved by something I have played, I am delighted. What that song may mean to me is beside the point once I have shared it for interpretation by a listener.

What are the lines that connect the legacy of American Roots Music from Gospel, Ragtime, and Blues to Folk, Country music and beyond?

The fault line through all folk music is its intrinsic connection to and reflection of everyday life, the struggles and the joys and an historical record of those who came before, what they valued, what they believed in, and what they experienced. Back when I was a music journalist (for Memphis’s daily newspaper, The Commercial Appeal) blues artists including Little Milton and Bobby Bland told me how they loved country music, in part because they found the stories akin to those in the blues. Of course, one could argue that the blues more than any other American vernacular music has had the most profound impact on our collective psyche. What form of music has it not touched in more than a century? Jazz, certainly, but also rock and roll, soul, gospel music, country, even rap. The DNA of blues is in just about everything at this point, including various global traditions. Personally, I adhere to a mode of thought that Black music, from spirituals to hip hop, has been one long song, a song of resistance, of aspiration, of validation. The Art Ensemble of Chicago said it best: “Great Black Music – Ancient to the Future.”

What are some of the most important lessons you have learned from your experience in the music paths?

1) Put in the hours when you’re young. 2) Absorb all you can. 3) Listen to – and even study under – non-guitar instrumentalists (on violin, piano, sax, etc.) to finesse timbre, voicings, and phrasing on the fretboard. 4) Seek out older players; they still have plenty to share, including the best stories! 5) Surround yourself with players better than you. 6) Pursue feel overperfection. 7) Be bold enough to develop your own musical voice, whether it happens to be commercial or not at the time.

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(Photo: William Lee Ellis, a roots music fingerpicking guitarist)