Raised in rural north central Florida, Rachel grew up singing backseat harmony to songs from the Baptist Hymnal and The Mamas and the Papas. Rachel was fascinated by lyric and melody from an early age and began writing her first songs in her 20's. She scaled back her writing in 2005 after the birth of her son then stopped writing altogether when her nephew was diagnosed with leukemia. “We celebrated my nephew's third birthday in his hospital room, not knowing if he would live or die,” she explains. “I had never experienced that level of hopeless. All the joy that I had once experienced through music simply evaporated. I couldn’t focus on writing; I was doing all I could to simply make it through the day.”
Her nephew's treatments continued for the next three years. He responded well and is now cancer free. Soon after, Rachel’s desire to write suddenly returned. She describes it as a epiphany, “I was just going through life, getting things done, working, taking care of my family. Then one day, very much out of the blue, I woke up with this keen understanding that it was time to start writing again. So I did - little things at first - a thought here, a line there. I dusted off my guitar and started coming up with rhythms and more lines until I had about 20 completed songs.”
Rachel’s lyrics delve deeply in the themes of love, heartache, and healing set to the musical background of something she calls blues-infused Americana/Folk. “My music is shaped from a variety of musical genres,” she explains. “I grew up singing hymns, listening to country music, and rhythm and blues. My songs are influenced by all of those forms.”
Rachel began performing at area open mic nights and songwriter’s circles. It was at this point that she became interested in recording an album. Over the past two years, she has worked with producer Dave Melosh of Medusa Productions in Gainesville to create “Twists and Tangles,” a 12-song album of original songs.
In addition to creating her album, Rachel has performed in venues and festivals throughout Florida including The Florida Folk Festival and The Will McLean Festival. She placed second in the 2015 Music4Macy Singer-Songwriter Contest and her song “Down to the River” was a top 10 finalist in the 2016 Will McLean Best New Florida Song Contest.
"Rachel Grubb writes lyrics with fearless honesty, delivers vocals with a unique and mesmerizing style and charms from the stage with a thoroughly approachable and engaging charisma. This is a talent whose star is rising. See her while you can still get a seat near the stage. Buy her music and be prepared to listen over and over.” - Mark Smith, Florida folk songwriter and recording artist
“The songs on Rachel’s debut album “Twists and Tangles” are well written, well performed, and well produced. Her natural vibrato carry the songs beautifully and you hear elements of folk, country, soul and blues - in other words a great Americana feel. If you don't fall in love with this voice, you are not listening!”
- Larry Mangum, Singer-songwriter
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