hypersongs

Molly Tuttle

A bluegrass guitarist and singer from Palo Alto who in 2017 became the first woman to win the IBMA's guitar player of the year, and whose Crooked Tree (2022) and City of Gold (2023) each won the Grammy for best bluegrass album.

The Tuttles and Berklee

Molly Rose Tuttle was born in Santa Clara, California on January 14, 1993 and grew up in Palo Alto. Her father is the bluegrass musician Jack Tuttle. She began guitar at eight, played onstage with her father at eleven, and at thirteen recorded The Old Apple Tree with him (2006 or 2007). At fifteen she joined the family band the Tuttles with AJ Lee, with her brother Sullivan on guitar and Michael Tuttle on mandolin, and made Introducing the Tuttles (2011 or 2012) and Endless Ocean (2013).

In 2012 she won Berklee merit scholarships, the first Hazel Dickens Memorial Scholarship and a prize in the Chris Austin Songwriting Competition at MerleFest, and appeared on A Prairie Home Companion with her father. At Berklee she joined the Goodbye Girls in 2014, with Allison de Groot, Lena Jonsson and Brittany Karlson, and moved to Nashville in 2015. Their Snowy Side of the Mountain (2016) and her IBMA Momentum Award followed.

Compass, Nonesuch and Golden Highway

The Rise EP (October 13, 2017, Compass, produced by Kai Welch and crowdfunded) came the year she became the first woman to win the IBMA guitar player of the year, again in 2018. She appeared on First Ladies of Bluegrass with Alison Brown, Missy Raines, Sierra Hull and Becky Buller, and at Hardly Strictly Bluegrass after Buddy Miller chose her. When You're Ready (April 5, 2019) and But I'd Rather Be with You (August 28, 2020) were on Compass, and in 2021 she formed Golden Highway with Shelby Means, Kyle Tuttle, Bronwyn Keith-Hynes and Dominick Leslie.

Crooked Tree (Nonesuch, April 1, 2022) was produced by Tuttle and Jerry Douglas and recorded live at Oceanway Studios in Nashville, with guests including Margo Price, Billy Strings, Old Crow Medicine Show, Sierra Hull, Dan Tyminski and Gillian Welch; it won the Grammy for best bluegrass album and the IBMA album of the year in 2023, with a best new artist nomination, and the Guardian gave it four stars. City of Gold (July 21, 2023, produced by Douglas and Tuttle at Sound Emporium) won the same Grammy in 2024; Pitchfork aside, PopMatters gave it 8 out of 10. In May 2025 she announced the end of Golden Highway and a new all-female band, and So Long Little Miss Sunshine (August 15, 2025, produced by Jay Joyce) followed. Her collaborators include Billy Strings, Bela Fleck, Orville Peck, Old Crow Medicine Show, Dave Matthews and Tommy Emmanuel.

Songs

  • White Freightliner Blues 2023

    Townes Van Zandt's song, taken up by bluegrass bands, which Tuttle recorded as a duet with Tommy Emmanuel in 2023.

  • Bury Me Beneath the Willow 2023

    A traditional ballad, recorded by Tuttle in 2023 for The Hunger Games: The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes.

Sources

  1. Molly Tuttle, Wikipedia
  2. Crooked Tree (album), Wikipedia
  3. City of Gold (Molly Tuttle album), Wikipedia
  4. Molly Tuttle, Nonesuch Records