Artist Bio
Grammy nominees Eric Brace & Peter Cooper have created a body of work that reflects their journalistic sensibilities, a love of harmony and wry humor, and their deep respect for the masters they've played with.
April 2013 marks the release of Eric Brace & Peter Cooper's third duo record, The Comeback Album, a sparkling set of songs that feature the pair's splendid harmonies and deft storytelling.
The duo forayed into the world of children's music with the Grammy-nominated I Love: Tom T. Hall's Songs of Fox Hollow, was featured on NPR’s “All Things Considered” and “Weekend Edition,” in USA Today and the Chicago Sun-Times, and was named a Top 5 Americana album by Rich Kienzle in the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette. Produced by Brace and Cooper, the album features performances by Patty Griffin, Buddy Miller, Bobby Bare, Duane Eddy, Jim Lauderdale, Elizabeth Cook, as well as Brace, Cooper, and others.
Eric Brace & Peter Cooper are touring partners and have collaborated on two previous albums. On Master Sessions the pair fronted a band that featured pedal steel guitar legend Lloyd Green and dobro master Mike Auldridge, and the album made numerous critics’ Best-of 2010 lists. Their first record together, You Don’t Have To Like Them Both, was a Top Ten album on the Roots, Americana, and Folk charts.
Brace and Cooper have acclaimed music careers outside their work as a duo. Brace, a former music journalist for the Washington Post leads the renowned roots rock band Last Train Home. Started in Washington, DC in 1997, and now based in Nashville, Brace & LTH have released eight CDs, several EPs, and a full-length concert DVD, with a new album in the works.
On moving to Nashville, Brace found a kindred spirit in Peter Cooper, a music writer for the Tennessean and other publications, and a professor of country music at Vanderbilt University’s Blair School of Music. Cooper released two critically praised solo records, Mission Door from 2008 and The Lloyd Green Album in 2010 on Brace’s Red Beet Records label.
On tour, Brace and Cooper’s shows are engaging and funny and reflect the pair's easy camaraderie. They can command the stage of a concert hall or festival with the same ease and intimate feel they bring to a coffeehouse. The duo has opened on large stages for John Prine, Nanci Griffith, Don Williams, Todd Snider, Rodney Crowell, Iris Dement, Chris Smither, Dan Tyminsky, Travis Tritt & Jerry Douglas, among others. They've shared the stage with Tom T. Hall, Jim Lauderdale, Suzy Bogguss, Dan Navarro, Marshall Chapman, Kim Carnes, Emmylou Harris, and others. They've recently played such U.S. festivals as Bristol Rhythm & Roots, Tin Pan South, Americana Music Festival, Folk Alliance International, 30A Songwriters, and Knoxville Rhythm and Blooms, as well as the Truck, Summertyne, and Maverick festivals in the U.K. They are frequent guest DJ’s on the legendary WSM radio station in Nashville.