Laurie Dameron

Billboard Magazine award recipient, Laurie Dameron, has been playing the guitar for over five decades. Between solo performances and performances with her band, Laurie D and the Blues Babes, she has performed for hundreds of venues in and out of Colorado over the past 20 years.

Laurie is extremely versatile and includes selections from all genres, allowing her to play a variety of venues. She has entertained at Boulder Creek Festival, Capital Hill People’s Fair and A Taste of Colorado and the 2008 Colorado Democratic Convention to name a few. Other performances include Denver’s popular clubs including Dazzle Jazz Club, The D Note, Mead Street Station and the historic Stanley Hotel in Beautiful Estes Park.

Dameron has opened for some of Denver’s most popular bands such as The Informants, The Delta Sonics, Lionel Young Band and Chris Daniels and the Kings and Hazel Miller.

Historical Bio

Singers and guitar players are a dime a dozen – or so they say. Laurie Dameron’s performances are an exception – they reflect a broad range of creative experiences accumulated since early childhood in Berea, Ohio.

Starting at age four on the piano and singing, Laurie learned guitar on her own and became proficient by age eight. From then on she was performing for any audience she could find. She moved to Boulder, Colorado in 1974. While attending Adams State College, she attained a minor in music. She toured with ASC Big Band Jazz Ensemble, twice participating in the Annual Greeley Jazz Festival where she impressed jazz virtuoso Johnny Smith enough to receive free guitar lessons. Laurie created the ASC Open Stage where she received plenty of solo time, collaborated with others and formed her first band and as an emcee she developed a unique rapport with her audience and fellow performers.

In the late eighties Laurie began playing professionally. She played with Denver’s jazz big band, Moodswing, performing frequently at venues such as the downtown Denver Westin Hotel. She later helped found one of Denver’s finest women’s R&B bands, Sister Swing, and debuted her original compositions in the 1992 Longmont Jazz Festival. Also around that time she began entertaining seniors which turned into her “day job” and in 2016 she celebrated 25 years declaring “I still love my job!!!”

In the following years she arranged, composed and produced two CD’s. In the summer of 2007 she played over one hundred shows and several festivals. In 2008 she arranged and produced a third CD, “I Can’t Wait to See You Again”, with 12 of her favorite jazz standards and one original, the title cut which won awards from Billboard Magazine.

In March of 2010 Laurie did a tour of New Zealand consisting of seven solo concerts and two concerts with Laurie D and the Blues Babes. She opened for Pacific Curls, Her Make Believe Band and also for New Zealand’s legend Midge Marsden.

Awards:

• Two-time recipient of awards from Billboard Magazine
• Top 10 finalist in the 2011 World Peace Song Contest for “What Can I Do?”
• Recipient of Boulder Magazine’s 2011 REAL Award
• Passed first round of 2013 auditions for America’s Got Talent
• Three time winner in the Colorado Music Business Association’s 2013, 2014, 2015 Song Contest
• “Member of the Year” award BPW Boulder 2014 (Business and Professional Women) for music and environmental work
• Winner EPA Region 8 Earth Day Video Contest 2015 “Dying of Human Souls”
• Keynote Speaker at EPW-USA Biennial Conference 2016 (Enterprising Professional Women
• “Trailblazer Woman of the Year” award 2017 BPW Boulder’s Celebration of Women

Laurie is also an active environmentalist. She has performed for the Rocky Mountain chapter of Sierra Club and is a volunteer for ECOCYCLE in Boulder Colorado.

In 2012 Laurie launched her “What Can I Do?”Spaceship Earth multimedia environmental presentation project to help fight climate change. This is a 30, 45 or 60 minute educational keynote presentation featuring the photography of John Fielder, Karl Snyder and Laurie Dameron along with slide shows, information, video and live music! (Please see more under the “Environmental Activism” tab.)

She has been proactive in raising awareness of mental health issues and suicide prevention and has volunteered with Boulder Carriage House, now called Bridge House, which is a day shelter for the homeless. She also performed for Musicians in Action, a nonprofit in Denver that uses music events to raise awareness and resources for Colorado’s homeless population.

Laurie has performed for many other corporate and fundraising events including Beautiful Art for Beautiful Minds. BABM was an annual event benefiting Chinook Clubhouse in Boulder. Chinook (used to be one of over 300 clubhouses around the world) helps persons with mental health issues in recovery with social, lunch and vocational programs. Laurie is part of Chinooks Speaker’s Bureau and often speaks on mental illness, drug and alcohol recovery at CU Boulder, local high schools and local law enforcement agencies.