Biographical Notes

Mark Dix began writing and performing acoustic music in the seventies while in graduate school in Ithaca, New York. After moving to Boston and studying classical guitar at the New England Conservatory and at the Harrt College of music in Hartford, he began performing original solo acoustic guitar pieces at Boston area coffee houses.

In the late seventies he performed regularly at Club Passim in Cambridge, opening for guitar legends John Fahey, Pierre Bensusan, and Chris Smither, poet Allen Ginsberg and others. After dipping out of sight in the mid eighties to raise a family, Dix reappeared as rhythm guitarist and songwriter for the popular local band Whose Muddy Shoes. The band has played in a great variety of venues, from Club Passim in Cambridge to the Mt Washington hotel in New Hampshire. Recently, the Shoes opened for the Charlie Daniels Band at the North Shore Music Theatre in Beverly, MA.

While maintaining a steady presence as a band member, Dix has also been a favorite at area open mikes as a soloist, and has been featured at the Colonial Inn and the Acton Jazz cafe. With a growing reputation for consistently fine lyric writing and evocative melodies, his music covers a wide range of styles from high energy band numbers, to old-timey waltzes and laments.

"This Old Song", released in September, 2001, is produced by Seth Connelly and features exquisite pedal steel playing by Leo Egan, haunting fiddle tracks by Hanneke Cassel, and the rich three and four part harmony singing of Whose Muddy Shoes, along with Dix's own authoritative acoustic guitar and vocals. Selections include the bittersweet Appalachian style lament "Beside Me No More", the hypnotic solo guitar composition "Sounds Like Rain", the tongue in cheek and funky "Right to Sing the Blues", the anthemic folk-rock ballad "Resting Place", and the title song, which clearly evokes a country dance hall.

Mark is currently working on a new CD with the Whose Muddy Shoes Quartet. The CD, titled "All in Good Time" is due to be released in 2007.

Additional Notes

When not making music, Mark Dix is director of the high school at Dearborn Academy, in Arlington, Massachusetts. He is also co-author, with Paul Riley, of Discovering AutoCAD, a series of computer-aided design textbooks in continuous publication by Prentice-Hall since 1987.