ETTA BAKER

Born Etta Lucille Reid, Baker is best known for exposing a large audience to the distinctive Piedmont Blues finger-picking guitar style.

Her first introduction to a national audience came with Instrumental Music of the Southern Appalachians in 1956, a compilation album. Her version of "One-Dime Blues" and other traditional tunes that she two-finger-picked on her guitar caught the attention of the folk revival community.

Even though the album brought her critical acclaim, she declined offers to perform outside her home community. She focused instead on raising a family of nine children, caring for her husband when he became disabled, and working at a textile mill in Morganton.

When Baker reached her mid-sixties, she embarked upon a performing career.

Baker was a recipient of the North Carolina Folk Heritage Award in 1989 and the National Endowment for the Arts National Heritage Fellowship in 1991.