About Ellery

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"...the folk song is the source of all true melodies; the wellspring at which one must repeatedly renew and refresh oneself..." - Max Bruch 

I was struck upon reading that quote from Max Bruch recently, because it was his iconic and passionate violin concerto I was working on when I fell in love with Irish fiddling in 1992.  After growing up learning and playing classical violin, I dived into the well of traditional music at the end of my arts magnet school career - and stayed there. I spent over fifteen years as a professional performer in various Irish groups.  In 2013, I returned from three years in Israel with my husband and two young children, and decided to concentrate full-time on teaching. These days, I still love and play Irish music, but am enjoying using my teaching career to explore and expand my knowledge of various other genres of music, from Swedish to Texan to Quebecois. I'm revisiting my classical roots with the eye of someone who has spent a lot of time "in the well." I'm trying to compose more, and learning more about playing and teaching harmonically,  creatively and improvisationally after years of melody playing. 

Or, as Yo-Yo Ma defined it: "playing music." 

My performing career these days allows me to spend more time with my family, my kitchen and my bee-and-bird sustaining native plant garden. Currently, I enjoy collaborating with my longtime friend, Portland, Maine flute player Nicole Rabata and the fantastic guitarist Bethany Waickman in our Irish trio Fódhla. During COVID, a few conversations with fellow fiddlers Katie Grennan and Jessie Burns led to the formation of the fiddle trio powerhouse band "The Bow Tides" . In "normal times," I can also be persuaded to lead occasional Irish music sessions around the city of Boston. Before COVID, I was rehearsing an intricately arranged trio of traditional and new compositions with fiddler Julie Metcalfe and cello player Liz Davis.

I spent four years touring and fiddling around the continental U.S. with the acclaimed Irish band Gaelic Storm. In 2008, I co-founded the Boston-based all-female vocal and instrumental group Long Time Courting, and performed with them until my husband’s radio reporting career took our family to Jerusalem, Israel from 2010-2013.

In 2015, I was invited to Duluth, MN to perform Nickitas Demos' Long Journey Home, Double Concerto for Celtic Fiddler and Bluegrass Fiddler  with the Lake Superior Chamber Orchestra under the direction of Warren Friesen.  

My earlier career consisted of stints with Vermont’s bagpipe rock band Whisky Before Breakfast, jighead, singer Cathie Ryan, Scottish pianist James Ross and banjo player Olive Brennan.

I also compose and record fun and modern music for competitive Irish dancers in partnership with my very talented former bandmate, Gaelic Storm’s drummer and co-producer Ryan Lacey, under the label rum & raisin records.

I am a proud alumna of Cincinnati, Ohio’s magnet high school School for Creative and Performing Arts. In 2001 I graduated from the second-ever class of the M.A. in Traditional Irish Music, University of Limerick’s Irish World Music Centre, which has produced many world-class artists in the world of Irish and Celtic music. In between, I earned a B.S. in Geology from the University of Vermont, and managed to spend my junior year abroad in Cork, Ireland as a geology and traditional music student at UCC.