Stephen Cohen is a performing and recording artist, acoustic guitarist, singer/songwriter, composer,
cigar box guitar player, and visual artist. He was born in Pawtucket, Rhode Island, where
he played
jazz trombone at the age of 12, then started
playing acoustic guitar, composing music and writing
songs
at age 14. He attended Brandeis University in Massachusetts
for 3 years before leaving school,
guitar in hand, to travel
across the United States. After many adventures along the
way, including stops
in Colorado, where he lived in a tree house in the mountains and in a dome in a commune, and New Mexico,
where he performed in restaurants and coffee houses in Santa Fe, Stephen made his home in Oregon, where
he completed his Bachelor's Degree in Art at the University of Oregon, raised 2 children, and worked a
variety
of jobs over the years while always playing guitar, composing music, writing songs, recording and performing.
He now lives in Portland, Oregon with his wife Kate and their dog.
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| Stephen plays his homemade cigar box guitar photo by Ben Sussman |
His first album, "The Tree People", was a vinyl album
recorded at Rocking A Ranch, a studio in the woods near Eugene, Oregon, in 1979.
The Tree People were a creative acoustic music ensemble
originally formed in the late
1970’s in Eugene, Oregon. Founding members were Stephen Cohen on acoustic guitar
and voice, and Jeff Stier on
recorders, flute and percussion. They performed, at times
with
third and fourth band members, at concerts and festivals in the
Eugene area for 7 years.
They recorded two albums, "The Tree
People" in 1979, and "Human Voices" in 1984.
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Cover drawing (by
Stephen Cohen) of the 1979 vinyl album, "The Tree People"
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The Tree People, 1979, with James Thornberry, Jeff Stier, Rachel Laderman and Stephen Cohen
Photo
by Dina Harmon |
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Cover drawing (by Stephen Cohen) of the 1984 Tree People
album
"Human Voices"
Listen to
Grandfather, and Dance from Human Voices
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After the Tree
People disbanded in the mid 1980’s, Stephen continued his music
career,
moving to Portland, Oregon in the mid 1990’s, composing
music, writing songs, creating
visual art and original
sculptural percussion instruments using used guitar strings and
other found objects, along with woods and metals,and performing at concerts and festivals
across the United States, including the
Philadelphia Folk Festival and the
Kerrville Folk Festival
in Texas (where he was an award winner for songwriting in
2000). He recorded three albums
during that period, including Stephen and the Talk Talk Band in 2004,and his nationally acclaimed
2006 album Here Comes the Band,
a children's album, which includes a 20 page illustrated booklet
with paintings and drawings by Christopher Shotola-Hardt and
lyrics and activities,
and which
features songs
that Stephen performs in his interactive performances for children. Stephen has
done children and family performances at the Long Island Children's Museum, the Bay Area Discovery
Museum in Sausalito, California, the Please Touch
Museum in Philadelphia, the Providence (R.I.)
Children's Museum, the Kids Discovery Museum in Bainbridge Island, Washington, and the Freight and Salvage
Coffeehouse in Berkeley, California. He was a showcase artist at the 5th and final Kindiefest in Brooklyn in 2013.
He has done countless concerts, performances, workshops
and residencies in his home state of Oregon, including
a series of artist residencies in which he assists students and making instruments,
composing music, writing songs,
and producing albums and videos of the results.One such residency, at Wilsonville High School, was featured in
a story
on Oregon Public Broadcasting's Art Beat show in 2002. One of the songs created at that residency was
You Need to Get to Know Me. |
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| Stephen with guest singer at the Long Island Children's Museum: photo by Ben Sussman |
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Meanwhile, the first Tree People album, originally released in
vinyl and sold only in Eugene, Oregon,
somehow appeared across
the ocean, and was discovered worldwide by record collectors
twenty five
years after it was first recorded. Stephen was
contacted by several record companies, leading to
CD and vinyl
reissues of the first two Tree People albums by record companies
in Japan, Tiliqua,
and Spain,
Guerssen Records,
and Stephen’s solo acoustic guitar piece from the first album,
The Tree People, "No More School", was included in an acoustic
guitar collection,
Wayfaring Strangers, Guitar Soli, by the Chicago
record company
The Numero Group.
The Tree People, whose original music was hard to classify the
first time around, were now being
called “Fathers of Freak Folk”
and “Psych Folk Pioneers”.
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And then the
second life of the Tree People began. Stephen and Jeff, with new member, Seattle double bass player Rich Hinrichsen, began
rehearsing, making new arrangements old material, creating and
recording new music, and performing in concerts and festivals
throughout the Pacific Northwest, including performances at the
Mississippi Studios, the White Eagle and Performance Works
Northwest in Portland, the Matrix in Chehalis, Washington, the
Upstage in Port Townsend, Washington, and the Arts in Nature
Festival and Northwest Folklife Festival in Seattle.
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| The Tree People at the White Eagle in 2007: Jeff, Rich, and Stephen |
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| photo by Chris Leck |
Guerssen Records,
of Spain released CD and vinyl editions of a 3rd, new and last
Tree People album,
It's My Story. Jeff Stier retired from the group
after playing on the new album and taking part in his last Tree
People performance at the
It's My Story release concert
at the Old Church in Portland on November of 2010.
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"It's My Story" album cover: photo by Chris Leck, graphics by Kristin Summers
Listen to the title song:It's My Story |
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Stephen
and Rich did their
last
performance under the Tree People name on March
12th , 2011 at the
Musiques
Disperses Festival in Spain. There they started a practice, which became a tradition with the
WALKING WILLOWS, of having local musicians sit
in on a few songs. Here they are, the 2 of them,
and with two wonderful Spanish musicians,
Jordi Gallen on cello and Hector Beberide Farrus on mandolin:
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| photo by Ben Sussman |
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| Rich and Stephen at the by hand album release concert at the Old Church: photo by Julie Keefe |
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| Stephen playing cigar box guitar at Salem Art Association Upcycle event: photo by Glenn Bledsoe |
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| Here is Stephen on the porch with a cigar box guitar he built himself: photo by Kate Davis |
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