Myra Ann Patterson is a multi-instrumentalist whose musical journey is a soulful celebration of American roots music. She derived her earliest musical inspiration from Fiddler’s Grove and Mt. Airy fiddlers’ conventions, where her father played bass and guitar, and she began to dream of someday being able to fiddle. She began playing violin at the age of 10. An alumna of Watauga High School band and orchestra, she was inspired by director Billy Ralph Winkler to consider music a professional calling.
Myra earned her Bachelor’s Degree in Music Education from ASU, where she studied with Dr. Nancy Bargerstock, who was instrumental in revolutionizing her technique and musicianship. Myra moved to Chicago in 2006, where she taught violin, viola, and fiddle at the Old Town School of Folk Music and the Hyde Park Suzuki institute. She earned an MA in Humanities from the University of Chicago in 2008, where she studied ethnomusicology and wrote about the contemporary Chicago blues scene.
During her time in Chicago she was blessed to share the stage as a violinist and guitarist with many of her mentors, including James Wheeler, Billy Branch and the Sons of Blues, Doktu Rhute Muuzic, Lurrie Bell, Melvin Smith, and Willie Hayes. She lived in Memphis from 2013 to 2023 where she played viola and violin with the Memphis String Quartet, and performed Blues, R&B and Soul music as house guitarist at Wild Bill’s blues club, and on Beale Street with her band Myra Hall and the Players, as well as with
mentor and Beale Street veteran Earl “the Pearl” Banks. She also played guitar and fiddle with the Earthquakers Contradance band, as well as fiddle with the Museworthies, who specialize in Irish,
German, and other traditional European derived ethnic music.
As dedicated to teaching as to performing, Myra’s students have distinguished themselves as members of the Chicago Youth
Symphony and Memphis Youth Symphony programs, and North Carolina and Tennessee Western Regional and All State Orchestras, and many popular music ensembles. Myra relishes every opportunity to share the remarkable musical heritage that she has been blessed with as we carry great musical traditions into the future.
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