Andy Hedges, Advisory Board member
Songster and reciter
Andy Hedges is a songster and reciter. His varied repertoire includes classic cowboy poetry recitations, obscure cowboy songs, dust bowl ballads, and blues. He taught himself to play the guitar when he was 14 and began collecting classic cowboy poems and traditional cowboy songs.
He has released 11 albums, including four joint projects with songwriter Andy Wilkinson. His album Shadow of a Cowboy was honored in 2023 with the Western Heritage Award for Traditional Western Album, presented by the National Cowboy & Western Heritage Museum.
Andy also hosts a podcast, Cowboy Crossroads, which features in-depth interviews with poets, musicians, songwriters and historians, and hosts the quarterly one-hour Cowboy Crossroads Radio Program on WSM Radio from Nashville. The program features cowboy poetry, western music, and interviews from the Cowboy Crossroads archives. Each episode explores a different theme from the working cowboy West and beyond.
In 2023, he made his debut at the Grand Ole Opry in Nashville, Tennessee, and in 2024, Andy brought his double album of duets called Roll On, Cowboys live to the Cactus Theater in Lubbock, to Alpine as the Lone Star Cowboy Poetry Gathering's Saturday night show, and to Carnegie Hall in New York City.
He lives in Lubbock with his wife and children.
"Andy could very well carry on the traditions when all of us old guys are gone. I'd feel assured in knowing the music of our great American West was in good hands."
— Don Edwards
"Andy is just the kind of artist I like. Deep into the tradition and carrying it into the future with his own voice."
— Jim Rooney
"I've always admired Andy Hedges for his longstanding fascination for classic cowboy songs. He sings 'em with just the right amount of grit and wry cowpoke humor."
— Michael Martin Murphey
"He embodies the future of the tradition."
— Waddie Mitchell
"Hedges blends tradition with vanguard . . . "
— Jennifer Denison, Senior Editor, Western Horseman
". . . Andy is at the epicenter of the collective beating heart of cowboy poetry and music. As an artist, and as a man, he is among the finest this renaissance has to offer."
— Randy Rieman
Website: andyhedges.com