About Chris Smither
William Christopher Smither is an American folk/blues singer, guitarist, and songwriter. His music draws deeply from the blues, American folk music, and modern poets and philosophers.
He was born in Miami, Florida, United States to Catherine and William J. Smither. Although Smither does not himself credit family influence for his talents, uncle Howard E. Smither was an award-winning musicologist and author, and father William was a professor of Spanish and Mexican culture. The Smither family lived in Ecuador and the Rio Grande Valley in Texas before settling in New Orleans when Chris was three years old. He grew up in New Orleans, and lived briefly in Paris where he and his twin sister Mary Catherine attended French public school. In Paris Smither got his first guitar, which his father brought him from Spain. Shortly after, the family returned to New Orleans where his father taught at Tulane University.
In 1960, Smither and two friends entered and won a folk "Battle of the Bands" at the New Orleans Saenger Theatre. Two years later, Smither graduated from Benjamin Franklin High School in New Orleans and went on to attend the University of the Americas in Mexico City planning to study Latin-American anthropology like his father. It was there that a friend played Smither the Lightnin' Hopkins' record "Blues in My Bottle". After one year in Mexico, Smither returned to New Orleans where he attended Tulane for one year and discovered Mississippi John Hurt's music through the Blues at Newport 1963 album on Vanguard Records. Hurt and Hopkins would become cornerstone influences on Smither's own music.
In 1964, Smither flew to New York City two days prior to boarding the SS United States for the five-day transatlantic voyage to Paris for his Junior Year Abroad program, which his father helped administer for Tulane. While in New York, he stopped at The Gaslight Cafe to see his hero, Mississippi John Hurt. Once in Paris, Smither often spent time playing his guitar instead of attending classes.
Smither returned to New Orleans in 1965. With a few clothes and his guitar, he soon took off for Florida to meet another musical hero, Eric von Schmidt. Smither arrived uninvited at von Schmidt's door; von Schmidt welcomed Smither in, and upon listening to him play, advised him to go north to seek a place in the burgeoning folk scene in New York City or Cambridge, Massachusetts. Smither followed this advice, and arrived at Club 47 in Harvard Square several weeks later and found von Schmidt performing. Von Schmidt invited Smither on stage to play three songs.
Smither soon began writing and performing his own songs. He achieved some local notice and by 1967 was featured on the cover of The Broadside of Boston magazine. In 1968, music photographer David Gahr's book, The Face of Folk Music featured Smither's picture.
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