Eliza Gilkyson was Thorne Dreyer’s guest on Rag Radio, Friday, December 16, 2011.

Gilkyson, a Grammy-nominated recording artist and a member of the Texas Music Hall of Fame, is one of the most respected musicians in folk and Americana music circles. The daughter of legendary songwriter Terry Gilkyson, Eliza grew up in Los Angeles and now lives in Austin.

Gilkyson has appeared on NPR and Austin City Limits and has toured with Richard Thompson, Patty Griffin, and Mary Chapin Carpenter. Her songs have been recorded and performed by such greats as Rosanne Cash, Tom Rush, and Joan Baez, who covered Eliza’s song “Requiem,” which was originally written as a prayer for those who lost lives in the devastating tsunami in Southeast Asia and was featured on NPR’s All Things Considered. It has been nominated for two Grammys on different recordings.

Eliza Gilkyson is also a political activist, involved with water conservation issues and the Worker’s Defense Project, which advocates rights for undocumented workers in the United States. In 2010, she co-founded 5604 MANOR, a community center in Austin that promotes political activism and community involvement around issues of race, patriarchy, and global injustice. In the past year, Eliza recorded two new albums: the Billboard-charting Red Horse and Roses at the End of Time, her first new solo recording in three years.

This episode of Rag Radio includes live performance and recorded music by Eliza Gilkyson.

Rag Radio — hosted and produced by Rag Blog editor Thorne Dreyer — is broadcast every Friday from 2-3 p.m. (CST) on KOOP 91.7-FM in Austin, and streamed live on the web. KOOP is an all-volunteer cooperatively-run community radio station in Austin, Texas.

Rag Radio, which has been aired since September 2009, features hour-long in-depth interviews and discussion about issues of progressive politics, culture, and history. After broadcast, all episodes are posted as podcasts and can be downloaded at the Internet Archive. Tracey Schulz is the show’s engineer and co-producer.

Rag Radio is also rebroadcast on Sundays at 10 a.m. (Eastern) on WFTE, 90.3-FM in Mt. Cobb, PA, and 105.7-FM in Scranton, PA. Rag Radio is produced in the KOOP studios, in association with The Rag Blog, a progressive internet newsmagazine, and the New Journalism Project, a Texas 501(c)(3) nonprofit corporation.

Coming up on Rag Radio:

• Dec. 30, 2011: Environmentalist and global warming activist Bruce Melton.
• Jan. 6, 2012: New Years Special with SDS founder and political activist Tom Hayden.

The Rag Blog