Wisconsinites Up for Grammy Awards

Middleton, Wisconsin native Paul Kowert (center) was nominated for a 2016 Grammy with his band, Punch Brothers, in the Best American Roots Song category. Submitted photo.

In early December, The Recording Academy announced the nominees for the 58th Annual Grammy Awards, which will be presented on Feb. 15. Among the nominees in 78 categories spanning from Record Of the Year to Best Spoken Word Album are Wisconsinites Cory Chisel, Paul Kowert and James Leary.

Cory Chisel, left

Fox Valley native Chisel is best known as the frontman of Americana, folk-rock band Cory Chisel and The Wandering Sons, who headlined Ministry Door County Medical Center’s outdoor “Celebrate Community” concert series in July 2015. He is also co-founder of the Appleton civic organization Mile of Music, the annual Americana music fest that has taken over downtown Appleton every August since 2013.

Chisel has been nominated, along with Rodney Crowell and Emmylou Harris, for Best American Roots Song for “The Traveling Kind,” a song he helped co-write with the duo on their new album.

Going head-to-head with Chisel in the same category is Middleton native and Punch Brothers bassist Paul Kowert, who along with the rest of the band (Chris Eldridge, Noam Pikelny, Chris Thile and Gabe Witcher) has been nominated for the song, “Julep,” off their album The Phosphorescent Blues.

University of Wisconsin professor of folklore and Scandinavian studies James Leary has been nominated in the Best Album Notes category, which recognizes the author of albums with well-written liner notes. Leary was nominated for his CD and book project, Folksongs of Another America: Field Recordings from the Upper Midwest, 1937-1946. Among the nominees he is up against in the category is Joni Mitchell, for her four-disc box set Love Has Many Faces: A Quartet, A Ballet, Waiting to Be Danced.

Watch the Grammy’s live Monday, Feb. 15 on CBS.