Val Mindel Bio Picture

Val Mindel – Singing

Val Mindel is a longtime musician, teacher and workshop leader, known for helping singers achieve that close, buzzy harmony that is a pillar of American old-time, bluegrass and early country harmony. She also addresses such indefinables as tone (that high lonesome sound), ornamentation, lead singing and more. She has taught at numerous music camps in the U.S. and abroad, including: Targhee, Ashokan, the Augusta Heritage Center, Centrum, Allegheny Echoes and, in the U.K., Sore Fingers. She is a founding member of the California-based Any Old Time string band (check out the band’s compilation album, I Bid You Goodnight on Smithsonian Folkways), and has two CDs with daughter and old-time country musician Emily Miller (In the Valley and Close to Home). Val is also the author of So You Want to Sing Folk Music, part of the “So You Want to Sing” series for Rowman & Littlefield and the National Association of Teachers of Singing. She lives in Elkins, West Virginia.

www.valandemmy.com