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Mike Seeger

Person · male · United States · New York City · born 1933 · died 2009 · recording since 1962

American folk musician and folklorist

old-time music

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Also known as 邁克·西格

Debut: 1962
Recording span: 46 years
Release groups: 14
Awards: 1
Timeline events: 16
Wiki language versions: 11

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Timeline

16 events▣ Album 12◦ Birth 1★ Debut release 1✦ Award 1† Death 1

1930s
1. 15 August 1933 · Birth
  Born 1933-08-15
  source: wikidata
1960s
1. 1962 · Debut release
  Debut release: Old Time Country Music
  First documented Album in the MusicBrainz discography.
  source: musicbrainz
2. 1962 · Album
  Album: Old Time Country Music
  Album
  source: musicbrainz
3. 1964 · Album
  Album: Mike Seeger
  Album
  source: musicbrainz
1970s
1. 1972 · Album
  Album: Music From True Vine
  Album
  source: musicbrainz
2. 1977 · Album
  Album: Tipple, Loom & Rail
  Album
  source: musicbrainz
1980s
1. 1980 · Album
  Album: Alice Gerrard & Mike Seeger
  Album
  source: musicbrainz
2. 1984 · Award
  Won: Guggenheim Fellowship
  source: wikidata
3. 1988 · Album
  Album: Fresh Oldtime String Band Music
  Album
  source: musicbrainz
1990s
1. 1991 · Album
  Album: Solo: Oldtime Country Music
  Album
  source: musicbrainz
2. 1994 · Album
  Album: Third Annual Farewell Reunion
  Album
  source: musicbrainz
3. 1996 · Album
  Album: Way Down in North Carolina
  Album
  source: musicbrainz
4. 15 September 1998 · Album
  Album: Southern Banjo Sounds
  Album
  source: musicbrainz
2000s
1. 2003 · Album
  Album: Old-Time Country Mandolin
  Album
  source: musicbrainz
2. 2007 · Album
  Album: Early Southern Guitar Sounds
  Album
  source: musicbrainz
3. 7 August 2009 · Death
  Died 2009
  source: wikidata

Biography

English biography966 words · 5 sectionssource: wikipedia-en · licence CC BY-SA 4.0 · revision 1378755715

Biography

Mike Seeger (August 15, 1933 – August 7, 2009) was an American folk musician and folklorist. He was a distinctive singer and an accomplished musician who mainly played autoharp, banjo, fiddle, dulcimer, guitar, harmonica, mandolin, dobro, jaw harp, and pan pipes. Seeger, a half-brother of Pete Seeger, produced more than 30 documentary recordings, and performed in more than 40 other recordings. He desired to make known the caretakers of culture that inspired and taught him. He was posthumously inducted into the International Bluegrass Music Hall of Fame in 2018.

Early life

Seeger was born in New York and grew up in Maryland and Washington D.C. His father, Charles Louis Seeger Jr., was a composer and pioneering ethnomusicologist, investigating both American folk and non-Western music. His mother, Ruth Crawford Seeger, was a composer. His eldest half-brother, Charles Seeger III, was a radio astronomer, and his next older half-brother, John Seeger, taught for years at the Dalton School in Manhattan. His next older half brother was Pete Seeger. His uncle, Alan Seeger, the poet who wrote "I have a rendezvous with Death", was killed during the First World War. Seeger was a self-taught musician who began playing stringed instruments at the age of 18. He also sang Sacred Harp with British folk singer Ewan MacColl and his son, Calum. Seeger's sister Peggy Seeger, also a well-known folk performer, married MacColl, and his sister Penny wed John Cohen, a member of Mike's musical group, New Lost City Ramblers.
The family moved to Washington D.C. in 1936 after his father's appointment to the music division of the Resettlement Administration. While in Washington D.C., Ruth Seeger worked closely with John and Alan Lomax at the Archive of American Folk Song at the Library of Congress to preserve and teach American folk music. Ruth Seeger's arrangements and interpretations of American Traditional folk songs in the 1930s, 1940s and 1950s are well regarded.

Musical career

At about the age of 20, Mike Seeger began collecting songs by traditional musicians on a tape recorder. Folk musicians such as Lead Belly, Woody Guthrie, John Jacob Niles, and others were frequent guests in the Seeger home.
In 1958 he co-founded the New Lost City Ramblers, an old-time string band in New York City, during the Folk Revival. The other founding members included John Cohen and Tom Paley. Paley later left the group in 1962 and was replaced by Tracy Schwarz. The New Lost City Ramblers directly influenced countless musicians in subsequent years. The Ramblers distinguished themselves by focusing on the traditional playing styles they heard on old 78rpm records of musicians recorded during the 1920s and 1930s. The members in Mike and Tracy's other band, Strange Creek Singers were Alice Gerrard, Hazel Dickens, and Lamar Grier.

Seeger received six Grammy nominations and was the recipient of four grants from the National Endowment for the Arts, including a 2009 National Heritage Fellowship, which is the United States government's highest honor in the folk and traditional arts. His influence on the folk scene was described by Bob Dylan in his autobiography, Chronicles: Volume One. He was a popular presenter and performer at traditional music gatherings such as Breakin' Up Winter.
Eight days before his 76th birthday, Mike Seeger died at his home in Lexington, Virginia, on August 7, 2009, after stopping cancer treatment.
The Mike Seeger Collection, which includes original sound and video recordings by Mike Seeger, is located in the Southern Folklife Collection of the Wilson Library of the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.

Recordings with the New Lost City Ramblers

New Lost City Ramblers (Smithsonian Folkways) (1958)
Old Timey Songs for Children (Smithsonian Folkways) (1959)
Songs for the Depression (Smithsonian Folkways) (1959)
New Lost City Ramblers – Vol. 2 (Smithsonian Folkways) (1960)
Newport Folk Festival, 1960, Vol. 1 (Vanguard - VRS 9083) (1960)
New Lost City Ramblers – Vol. 3 (Smithsonian Folkways) (1961)
New Lost City Ramblers (Smithsonian Folkways) (1961)
New Lost City Ramblers – Vol. 4 (Smithsonian Folkways) (1962)
American Moonshine and Prohibition Songs (Smithsonian Folkways) (1962)
New Lost City Ramblers – Vol. 5 (Smithsonian Folkways) (1963)
Gone to the Country (Smithsonian Folkways) (1963)
String Band Instrumentals (Smithsonian Folkways) (1964)
Rural Delivery No. 1 (Smithsonian Folkways) (1964)
Modern Times (Smithsonian Folkways) (1968)
New Lost City Ramblers with Cousin Emmy (Smithsonian Folkways) (1968)
Remembrance of Things to Come (Smithsonian Folkways) (1973)
On the Great Divide (Smithsonian Folkways) (1975)
Earth is Earth (Smithsonian Folkways) (1978)
Tom Paley, John Cohen, Mike Seeger Sing Songs of the New Lost City Ramblers (Smithsonian Folkways) (1978)
20th Anniversary Concert, with Elizabeth Cotten, Highwoods String Band, Pete Seeger & the Green Grass Cloggers (FLYING FISH (Rounder) (1978)
The Early Years, 1958–1962 (Smithsonian Folkways) (1991)
Out Standing in their Field: The New Lost City Ramblers, Vol 2, 1963–1973 (Smithsonian Folkways) (1993)
There Ain't No Way Out (Smithsonian Folkways) (1997)
40 Years of Concert Recordings (Rounder) (2001)
50 Years: Where Do You Come From? Where Do You Go? (Smithsonian Folkways) (2008)

Recordings with others

Jean Ritchie - The Most Dulcimer (Greenhays) (1984) (mandolin on "Over the River to Feed My Sheep" and banjo on "Movin' On Down the River")
Tim & Mollie O'Brien - Away On the Mountain (Sugar Hill) (1994) (banjo on "Ain't No Grave Gonna Hold My Body Down")
Tony Trischka - Glory Shone Around: A Christmas Collection (Rounder) (1995) (fiddle on "Christmas Eve ", vocals and banjo on "Child of God")
Robert Plant and Alison Krauss – Raising Sand (Rounder) (2007) (autoharp on "Your Long Journey")
Ry Cooder – My Name Is Buddy (Nonesuch) (2007) (banjo and fiddle on "Suitcase in My Hand", fiddle, harmonica, and Jew's harp on "Strike!"; banjo on "J. Edgar", fiddle on "Footprints in the Snow", "Christmas in Southgate", "Red Cat Till I Die", "Cardboard Avenue", "Farm Girl" and "There's a Bright Side Somewhere")
Tony Trischka - Territory (Smithsonian Folkways) (2008) (banjo and harmonica on "Noah Came to Eden")

Discography & profile

Normalised profile

Percentiles are computed over every artist in the database, so a tier-3 artist can still sit in the 95th percentile on a single axis.

Normalised profile metrics with percentile rank
Metric	Value	Percentile
Wikipedia language versions	11	61.8th
Spotify monthly listeners	—	no data
Release groups in DB	14	84.5th
Studio albums	12	92.8th
Awards recorded	1	89th
Timeline events	16	91.8th
Recording span (years)	46	86.9th
Genres	3	80.4th

Percentiles are computed at render time; missing values mean the artist has no data on that axis.

Discography (14 release groups · 12 studio albums)

Albums · 12

Old Time Country Music
1962 · studio album
Search Spotify Search YouTube Music
Tracklist · 18 tracks
A1Richmond Cotillion
A2The Baldheaded End of a Broom
A3Sad and Lonesome Day
A4Lord Thomas
A5Oh My Little Darling
A6Bonaparte's Retreat
A7Frankie
A8Will the Weaver
A9Rollin' On
B1Don't Let Your Deal Go Down
B2Worried Blues
B3The Story of the Mighty Mississippi
B4Man of Constant Sorrow
B5Handsome Molly
B6John Hardy
B7Johnson City Blues
B8Fisherman's Luck
B9Sourwood Mountain
Mike Seeger
1964 · studio album
Search Spotify Search YouTube Music
Tracklist · 15 tracks
A1Hello Stranger
A2Oh Molly Dear
A3Bachelor's Hall
A4We Live A Long Long Time
A5Fishing Blues
A6Johnny Grey
A7The Two Soldiers
B1Waterbound
B2Leather Breeches
B3Young McAfee On The Gallows
B4Old Rachel
B5It'll Aggravate Your Soul
B6Fair And Tender Ladies
B7Wild Bill Jones
B8I've Been All Around This World
Music From True Vine
1972 · studio album
Search Spotify Search YouTube Music
Tracklist · 14 tracks · 35:50
A1Birmingham Tickle2:36
A2I've Rambled This Country Both Earlye And Late3:01
A3The Sailor And The Soldier1:56
A4Don't Let Your Deal Go Down3:15
A5Old Grey Mare2:40
A6Rattlesnake Daddy2:39
A7Buck Dancer's Choice1:57
B1Old Blind Drunk John2:01
B2In And Around Nashville3:15
B3Little Betty Ann2:02
B4Black Is The Color Of My True Lover's Hair1:50
B5Gambling Man3:34
B6Roving Cowboy3:00
B7Lost Indian2:04
Tipple, Loom & Rail
1977 · studio album
Search Spotify Search YouTube Music
Tracklist · 16 tracks
A1A Factory Girl
A2Coal Creek Troubles
A3Edward Lewis
A4Come All You Coal Miners
A5The Miner's Blues
A6Harlan County Blues
A7Cotton Mill Blues
A8The Reckless Motorman
B1The New Market Wreck
B2Cotton Mill Colic
B3The Virginia Strike Of '23
B4Roane County Strike At Harriman, Tenn.
B5The Hard Working Miner
B6Hard Times In These Mines
B7Spinning Room Blues
B8The Death Of John Henry
Alice Gerrard & Mike Seeger
1980 · studio album
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Tracklist · 14 tracks · 38:25
A1Bowling Green2:10
A2St. Louis Blues3:32
A3Fugitive’s Lament3:00
A4Oh Blue2:18
A5Old Bunch of Keys2:38
A6Sugar Baby3:05
A7Dear Companion2:40
B1Doggin’ in the U.S. Mail2:04
B2Quiero Decir Gracias3:30
B3Love Was the Price2:15
B4Needmore2:10
B5Pretty Polly3:55
B6Gone to View That Land2:42
B7New Freedom March2:26
Fresh Oldtime String Band Music
1988 · studio album
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Tracklist · 11 tracks · 43:49
1Boatman2:36
2Mabel2:12
3Black Jack Davey5:07
4Billy in Waynesboro3:24
5Poor Black Sheep4:20
6East Tennessee Blues / Goin' Crazy4:43
7Ten Broeck and Mollie6:14
8Cotton Eyed Joe3:29
9Pork Fat Makes My Chicken Tan5:55
10Wagnerd2:36
11Wedding Waltz3:13
Solo: Oldtime Country Music
1991 · studio album
Search Spotify Search YouTube Music
Tracklist · 18 tracks · 48:51
1Tennessee Dog2:05
2Ground Hog4:09
3Roustabout4:01
4Sallie Gooden2:30
5The Wreck of the Tennessee Gravy Train2:44
6Shaking the Pines in the Holler3:59
7Dog & Gun4:02
8Candy Girl2:32
9Tucker's Barn2:30
10Wind & Rain3:59
11Fare You Well, Green Fields1:40
12Poor Indian2:08
13We're Stole and Sold From Africa2:35
14Rockbridge Holler0:35
15Quill Ditty1:52
16Rolling & Tumbling Blues3:14
17Blue Tail Fly1:02
18Prairie Ronde Waltz3:14
Third Annual Farewell Reunion
1994 · studio album
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Tracklist · 23 tracks · 1:11:39
1Shaking Off the Acorns3:32
2Leaving Tennessee2:48
3The Memory of Your Smile3:01
4Only Remembered3:44
5The Mayor Is a Good Old Boy3:03
6Boat's Up the River2:28
7East Virginia Blues2:54
8They're at Rest Together2:52
9The Ballad of Hollis Brown5:28
10Oh My Little Dutch Girl2:02
11Deep Shady Grove4:11
12Cripple Creek1:56
13Oldtime Sally Ann2:51
14Rose in the Mountain2:03
15Little Cabin Home on the Hill3:35
16Lord Thomas and Fair Ellender4:50
17900 Miles2:56
18Savoy Family Waltz3:29
19I'm Going to the West3:13
20Bound Steel Blues2:59
21Brown's Ferry Blues2:28
22You've Been a Friend to Me3:02
23Frog Heaven2:14
Way Down in North Carolina
1996 · studio album
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Tracklist · 21 tracks · 53:15
1Wandering Boy2:19
2I Have No One to Love Me2:54
3Down to Tampa3:21
4The Rout2:09
5Trader Boatman1:37
6Green Icy Mountain2:39
7Cacklin' Hen2:17
8Make Me a Pallet2:09
9Goodbye, Little Bonnie2:50
10What'll I Do With the Baby-O1:53
11Way Down in North Carolina3:28
12Rabbit Chase1:44
13New River Train3:08
14Tee La Lollee2:07
15Loving Emma1:58
16Little Maggie4:02
17Walking That Pretty Girl Home1:59
18Cousin Sally Brown1:18
19Chilly Winds2:16
20That Girl I Love3:46
21Let Me Fall3:21
Southern Banjo Sounds
1998 · studio album
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Tracklist · 26 tracks · 1:05:26
1Soon in the Morning Babe1:24
2Josh Thomas’s Roustabout2:41
3Jim Crack Corn2:16
4Darling Cora3:51
5Devil’s Dream1:53
6Little Birdie3:23
7Around the World2:24
8Whoopin’ Up Cattle3:02
9Flop Eared Mule1:49
10Lost Gander2:23
11The Sailor and the Soldier2:01
12American Spanish Fandango2:13
13Got No Silver Nor Gold Blues2:23
14We’re Up Against It Now2:31
15That’s What the Old Bachelor’s Are Made Of2:38
16The Last of Callahan1:49
17Lady Gay3:44
18Down South Blues2:49
19Last Night When My Willie Come Home3:25
20Wabash Blues2:04
21Bright Sunny South2:57
22Roll on John3:12
23Needlecase1:31
24Come My Little Pink2:45
25Battle in the Horseshoe1:55
26I’m Head Over Heels in Love2:23
Old-Time Country Mandolin
2003 · studio album
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Tracklist · 48 tracks · 57:27
1Intro1:12
2Holding The Pick0:23
3Holding The Mandolin0:46
4Left Hand Position0:39
5Chord Shapes1:06
6Basic Rhythem Stums: Explained1:16
71st Pattern0:41
82nd Pattern0:44
93rd Pattern0:46
104th Pattern0:45
115th Pattern0:35
125th Pattern Played Slower0:30
13Putting the Patterns Together0:42
14Waltz Time Explained0:33
15Basic Waltz Time Pattern #1 in G0:44
16Basic Waltz Time Pattern #2 in C0:26
17Basic Waltz Time Pattern #3 in D1:06
18All Tee Good Times Are Past and Gone: Played0:59
19Basic Melody Playing0:58
20Red River Valley: Played1:31
21Boil Them Cabbage: B Part0:57
22Boil Them Cabbage: B Part Back-Up Lick0:36
23Boil Them Cabbage: A Part1:08
24Sliding Double Stops: Explained0:47
25Sliding Double Stops: Played3:24
26Keep On The Sunny Side: Played1:28
27Hawkins Rag: Explained0:47
28Hawkins Rag: Played0:37
29Hawkins Rag: Bars 1-4 Broken Down1:29
30Hawkins Rag: Bars 5-61:18
31Hawkins Rag: Bars 1-8 Played Slowly0:18
32Hawkins Rag: Bars 9-12 Played0:16
33Hawkins Rag: Bars 13-16 Broken Down1:05
34Hawkins Rag: 1st Part Played Slowly0:44
35Hawkins Rag: 2nd Part Broken Down1:43
36Hawkins Rag: 2nd Part Played Slowly0:27
37Hawkins Rag: Whole Tune Played at Speed0:59
38Cowboy Waltz: Played2:53
39Keep On The Sunnyside: Explained1:15
40Keep On The Sunnyside: Played2:45
41Blackeyed Susie: Explained1:00
42Blackeyed Susie: Played1:39
43Chinese Breakdown: Played1:55
44Green Valley Waltz: Played2:23
45Lesley Riddle Blues: Played3:18
46Don't Let Your Deal Go Down: Played2:32
47Deep Elem Blues: Explained0:53
48Deep Elem Blues: Played2:29
Early Southern Guitar Sounds
2007 · studio album
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Tracklist · 28 tracks · 1:16:26
1Wildwood Flower0:54
2Old Chisholm Trail1:54
3Spanish Fandango2:20
4Shakin' the Pines in the Holler2:04
5Weary Lonesome Blues2:33
6White Oak Mountain3:16
7I'm Crazy Over You2:21
8Can't Get a Letter From Home2:48
9Steel Guitar Rag3:08
10Smoketown Strut2:58
11Big Kid's Barroom2:50
12Fishing Blues3:27
13After All Has Been Said and Done2:47
14Joe Lee's Tune2:00
15Carroll County Blues2:34
16Birmingham Tickle2:39
17Worried Blues3:48
18Kenny Wagner's Surrender2:52
19Arizona2:25
20Pearly Dew2:20
21Risselty Rosselty1:48
22Johnny Doyle4:10
23Black Jack David2:59
24John Henry3:37
25Buck Dancer's Choice3:24
26Riley And Spencer4:27
27When This World Comes to an End2:26
28Leaning On The Everlasting Arm1:37

Other · 1

Other release groups, by first release date
Cover	Year	Title	Notes	First release
	2003	True VineSearch Spotify Search YouTube Music Tracklist · 23 tracks · 1:03:26 1Breaking Up Ice in the Allegheny1:46 2Coo Coo Bird2:38 3Johnson Jinkson2:52 4Little Rabbit, Where’s Your Mammy?3:19 5The Raftsman’s Song1:43 6Honeycutt’s Holler0:28 7Did You Ever See the Devil, Uncle Joe?2:14 8Blow the Horn, Blow2:11 9Old Man2:46 10Spoonful3:33 11Shouting in Jerusalem3:20 12When Sorrows Encompass Me Round1:40 13Calico2:34 14Early in the Spring3:15 15Freight Train3:15 16Goodbye, My Little Darling2:09 17Don’t Let Your Deal Go Down4:06 18I’m Gonna Go Huntin’ for the Buffalo1:40 19Granddad Jim’s Waltz1:58 20The Golden Willow Tree7:02 21California Cotillion2:37 22Young Johnnie3:04 23Sail Away Ladies3:16		2003

Album · 1

Album release groups, by first release date
Cover	Year	Title	Notes	First release
	2008	Bowling GreenSearch Spotify Search YouTube Music Tracklist · 26 tracks · 1:08:28 1Bowling Green2:14 2St. Louis Blues3:34 3Fugitive's Lament3:06 4Oh Blue2:23 5Old Bunch of Keys2:42 6Sugar Baby3:08 7Dear Companion2:43 8Doggin' in the U.S. Mail2:09 9Quiero decir gracias3:34 10Love Was the Price2:21 11Needmore2:12 12Pretty Polly4:00 13Gone to View That Land2:20 14New Freedom March2:35 15In My Dear Old Southern Home2:48 16Coal Miner's Blues3:15 17Victory Rag1:58 18Black Waters4:43 19Private John Q1:45 20Buckdancer's Choice1:58 21Sunny Side of Life2:22 22You Done Me Wrong1:59 23The Death of Queen Jane1:44 24Sometimes I Feel Like a Motherless Child1:58 25Sweet Sunny South3:39 26Flatwoods1:18	Compilation	18 November 2008

Stats & PK

Percentile within all 23,672 published artists.Put Mike Seeger head-to-head →

Mike Seeger metrics with percentile rank among published artists
Metric	Value	Percentile
Wikipedia language versions	11	61.8th
Spotify monthly listeners	—	no data
Release groups in DB	14	84.5th
Studio albums	12	92.8th
Awards recorded	1	89th
Timeline events	16	91.8th
Recording span (years)	46	86.9th
Genres	3	80.4th

Awards & honours

Awards and honours, by year
Year	Award	Category	Result
1984	Guggenheim Fellowship		won

Line-up

Band line-up and band memberships with dates
Name	From	To
The Seeger Family(band)	—	present
Strange Creek Singers(band)	—	present
New Lost City Ramblers(band)	1958	present

Where this record comes from

portrait—Wikimedia Commons · CC0 · retrieved 11 October 2026
https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Mike_Seeger_plays_gourd_banjo_at_Breakin_Up_Winter.JPG
aliases/urls—musicbrainz · CC0 · retrieved 10 October 2026
https://musicbrainz.org/artist/22baef3d-f490-43da-bea8-3a9a4d149143
discography—musicbrainz · CC0 · retrieved 10 October 2026
https://musicbrainz.org/artist/22baef3d-f490-43da-bea8-3a9a4d149143
core—wikidata · CC0 · retrieved 10 October 2026
https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Q4992201
genre—wikidata · CC0 · retrieved 11 October 2026
https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Q4992201
seed-list—wikipedia · CC BY-SA 4.0 · retrieved 10 October 2026
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mike_Seeger
biography—wikipedia-en · CC BY-SA 4.0 · retrieved 10 October 2026
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mike_Seeger

Why this artist is in the database

List of folk musicians

Tier rule: curated genre/region list
Image: Fiddlefeller · CC0 · Wikimedia Commons
Wikidata: Q4992201 · MusicBrainz: 22baef3d-f490-43da-bea8-3a9a4d149143

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