John Duggleby, Juli Johnson, Meggie Shays

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John Duggleby

press release: Get to know your local singer-songwriters as they share their music and tell you their stories. This month's featured artists are John Duggleby, Juli Johnson, and Meggie Shays.  Your favorite brewmaster Jim Goronson has also brewed up a new release for the Parched Eagle Taproom called Promiseland Hefeweizen.

John Duggleby, an award-winning author of 11 books and hundreds of magazine articles, made his professional performing debut at age five at the Sunset Inn Supper Club in Muscatine, Iowa, singing, “You Must Have Been a Beautiful Baby” after the piano man bribed him with a nickel. After a hootenanny fling in a “baby Kingston Trio,” he grew up as a percussionist playing everything from orchestra tympani to

garage band rock and roll. As an adult he learned guitar as a more benign living room alternative. Over the years John has labored in several under-appreciated folk, 60s rock, Cajun, bluegrass and world music ensembles, but his main gig these days is playing over 100 one-man and duo shows a year for listeners of all ages, at venues ranging from coffeehouses, to senior centers, to libraries, to festivals. His songbook ranges from Stephen Foster and George M. Cohan to Beatles and Bruce Springsteen-- as well as his own material-- accompanied on guitar and who knows what else. John also leads drum circles and kitchen bands for groups including seniors and disabled people. John finally realized a decades-long dream with the 2014 release of his first ever album, Better Late Than Never, which can be heard at https:/soundcloud.com/duggleby. His songs have been finalists in the Great American and Great River Folk Festival Songwriting Contest, and Madison Area Music Awards (MAMAS); as well as runner-up in the international

www.SongoftheYear.com competition. One rose to #4 on the worldwide African music chart of Broadjam, one of the largest online music sites. John, who has received 2nd place for Singer/Songwriters in the Isthmus “Madison’s Favorites” reader’s poll, is the founder and former host of the monthly Songwriter Showcase at Tuvalu Coffeehouse in Verona. 

Juli Johnson is a singer/songwriter from Madison. Her music is acoustic, filled with expressive melodies and emotional lyrics. She writes songs based on her personal experiences and relationships. Her style is similar to alternative pop. If you like the sound of Nora Jones or the voice of Tracy Chapman you’ll enjoy Juli’s music. 

Juli began writing songs while she was in college. She studied musical theatre and French, and learned that she couldn't travel without a guitar and a notebook to write songs and poetry in. She left college with a Performing Arts degree. After doing a lot of community theatre, Juli moved to South Korea to teach English as a Foreign Language. She found herself spending the weekends on the beach with her guitar and a bottle of rice wine. Her beach time was spent soaking up sunshine and writing songs while listening to the waves on the shore. Then she met a music producer from Canada and spent the next year recording both an EP and a full-length album before moving back to the United States in early 2016. After a few months of living with her sister in Pittsburgh, she moved to Taiwan to teach English again. A family tragedy brought her back to the US a month later. At this point, Juli couldn’t sing with out pain due to overusing her voice while teaching. She returned to her former voice teacher in Madison, who helped her rehabilitate her vocal ability. It took about a year before she was able to sing without pain. Meanwhile, she stopped writing songs because not being able to sing made her very sad. 

After being completely miserable from not being able to sing, Juli decided to stop being miserable. She started studying music business and forced herself to sit alone quietly long enough to write songs. Eventually, with the help of her voice teacher, and a lot of hard work, her voice returned to normal and she was singing every day again, without pain! Currently, Juli is working on writing her first musical, and also performs her original music in Madison.

Meggie Shays is an indie singer/songwriter living in Madison.. Her roots come from rural Tennessee where she grew fond of nature and began learning piano at a young age. At age 12, she moved with her family to Mount Horeb. From there, she continued taking piano lessons while also beginning to write songs. After high school, she spent about 5 years in Milwaukee studying and pursuing architecture, all the while writing and playing music in her spare time. Longing to devote more of herself to her music, she moved back home and started work on finishing lingering song ideas and began performing solo. Within a couple years, she formed a steady band. She is currently working on her first EP. Meggie Shays's breezy yet powerful voice carries her lyrics that speak to the simple, yet complex emotions that underlie the human condition.