Christopher Shaw

Adirondack Singer, Songwriter, and Storyteller

Christopher Shaw was raised in the Adirondack Mountains of upstate New York.  He was born the son, of the son, of a commercial steamboat pilot on Lake George.  Shaw worked the big boats and grew up listening to the songs and stories passed down in those mountains from generation to generation, never suspecting he would bring those same songs and stories to audiences all over the world.

For over ten years Shaw toured for Taylor Guitars as a clinician demonstrating American Folk and country style guitar from Anchorage to Berlin.  In addition to his trips for Taylor, he has appeared at such highly respected venues as the Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts, two appearances for the Smithsonian Institute, the Philadelphia Folk Festival, the Old Songs Folk Festival, and the Chautauqua Institute, as well as music halls, festivals, and coffee houses across the US and Europe.  He has produced a number of TV soundtracks for Public Television.  Chris wrote the soundtrack and was “the voice of Seneca Ray” on the television special “Seneca Ray Stoddard: An American Original” seen coast to coast on PBS.   Most recently, a live concert special called “Chris Shaw: Live in Concert” is showing on PBS stations across the country

Shaw has nine recordings under his belt with another to be released this spring. His 1988 debut, “Adirondack”, has been inducted into the Library of Congress Folk Archives.  Performers who have contributed to Chris' recordings include such acoustic innovators as Artie Traum, John Sebastian, Garth Hudson (The Band), Vassar Clements, Cindy Cashdollar (Asleep at the Wheel), Tony Trischka, Jay Ungar, and Steve Riley.