Sunday, May 20, 2012

WMA Entertainer of the Year Juni Fisher June 2, 2012 at Uniontown, Wash.


On Saturday, June 2, 2012, 7:30 p.m., multi-award winning singer-songwriter Juni Fisher is scheduled to perform at Artisans at the Dahmen Barn in Uniontown. Audiences who enjoy storytelling through song, humor and even a bit of history, fans of the Western landscape and lifestyle, and folk music fans enjoy Juni’s concerts. Admission is $12 at the door.

Juni Fisher’s name is synonymous with the kind of song writing that, according to one promoter, “Plumbs the depth of your soul…” She is the first woman winner of Western Musician Association Entertainer of the Year.
 
Juni’s music awards are top notch:
  • 2005 Academy of Western Female Vocalist of the Year
  • 2005 WMA* Crescendo Award (*Western Music Association)
  • 2006 WMA Female Performer of the Year
  • 2007 WMA Song of the Year
  • 2008 WMA of the Year
  • 2008 National Cowboy and Western Heritage Museum Wrangler Award (Outstanding Album)
  • 2009 WMA Female Performer of the Year
  • 2009 WMA Album of the Year
  • 2011 WMA Female Performer of the Year
  • 2011 WMA Song of the Year
  • 2011 WMA Entertainer of the Year
Born in the San Joaquin Valley of California, Fisher grew up in a farming family, but between school and countless singing performances with her two sisters, Juni found a way to have horses, and 4-H and FFA honors followed her throughout her school years.
 
While studying Equine Science at the College of the Sequoias in Visalia, she rode young horses for her customers, and became known as a good horse show “catch rider“.  She rode her way through college, with top honors at Intercollegiate and Quarter Horse shows. Meanwhile, she was earning horse show entry money singing big band standards in a dance orchestra.

In her early adult years she apprenticed with a cowhorse trainer, and trained cowhorses from snaffle bitters to bridle horses, winning her first Snaffle Bit Futurity (IARCHA) in 1981, her first Bridle Horse Championship in 1983 (the Monterey Classic) while working on a cow calf operation, and running a roping arena.

Her bridle horses did day work on the ranch and competed weekends. If there was a campfire gathering with music, Juni was there with her guitar, singing the songs of the west she’d learned from her father.

In 1984, she moved to Santa Ynez, CA, to train cutting horses, taking her blossoming song writing skills with her.  A local band was quick to ask her to play rhythm guitar and sing leads and backups, and soon she was working L.A. area clubs with a country dance band, which was playing western and cowboy music.

Juni’s ability to ride at speed across the hills found her working as a foxhunting professional, and she accepted a one year position with a hunt club in Tennessee.

Point to point racing, steeplechasing, and horse trials took the place of cowhorses, while she honed her songwriting skills among Nashville’s finest.  Her first Western release, “Tumbleweed Letters” (1999) reached Monterey Cowboy Poetry and Music Festival director Gary Brown in late 2003. He shared Juni’s music with other promoters and soon Juni would shift to music full time as her profession. Fisher now performs at major festivals, and concert venues of all sizes across the US.
Artisans at the Dahmen Barn is a non-profit creativity center in the big white barn behind the famous iron wheel fence just off highway 195 in Uniontown.  The three storey facility is fully ADA compliant and there is no daily admission fee.  It is open Thursday through Sunday from 10 am to 6 pm.  Information:  www.artisanbarn.org or 509-229-3414.

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