Mike Farris

Biography

Mike Farris is an American musician. He was the founder and lead singer of the Nashville group Screamin' Cheetah Wheelies. He has been a solo act since 2001. After an earlier career with The Screamin' Cheetah Wheelies, Farris emerged in the early 2000's with his first solo album, "Goodnight Sun" that saw him develop and create music more in tune with his own personal spiritual journey. In June of 2007 he released the critically-acclaimed "Salvation in Lights" which married old time roots Gospe...

Mike Farris is an American musician. He was the founder and lead singer of the Nashville group Screamin' Cheetah Wheelies. He has been a solo act since 2001.

After an earlier career with The Screamin' Cheetah Wheelies, Farris emerged in the early 2000's with his first solo album, "Goodnight Sun" that saw him develop and create music more in tune with his own personal spiritual journey. In June of 2007 he released the critically-acclaimed "Salvation in Lights" which married old time roots Gospel sounds with his own unique arrangements that were mainly inspired by New Orleans Black Gospel, Stax and the blues. The music was both spiritual and personal as it deals with individual struggle but also has a commonality that music fans can enjoy purely for its soul.

He won the Americana Music Association's “New & Emerging Artist of the Year” award in 2008 and started to make a name for himself as a dynamic performer. In 2008 and 2009, Farris and his Roseland Rhythm Revue performed monthly residencies at Nashville’s’ Station Inn that he named “Sunday Night Shout!” The shows had audiences consisting of people from all walks of life and the goal was to make the crowd feel “excited, delighted and loved.” The official live recording of the Station Inn shows, "SHOUT! Live," was released in 2009 and won the Gospel Music Association’s Dove Award for “Best Traditional Gospel Album of the Year” in the spring of 2010.

When the “1,000 year flood” hit the Middle Tennessee state area in May of 2010 he gathered up some of the finest Nashville musicians including: Sam Bush, Ketch Secor & Gill Landry (Old Crow Medicine Show), Kenny Vaughan (Marty Stuart), Byron House (Robert Plant) and members of his Roseland Rhythm Revue to record six in 6 hours at Nashville’s Downtown Presbyterian Church. The music was a beautiful blend of old time country, gospel and blues with Mike leading the “Cumberland Saints” from the pulpit. In October of that year the EP was released as The Night The Cumberland Came Alive with partial proceeds donated to the Community Foundation of Middle Tennessee. The music is listed as Mike Farris and the Cumberland Saints on last.fm.

Farris amazes audiences whenever he plays solo or with any one of his different configurations from the stripped down to the full nine-piece Roseland Rhythm Revue. His voice connects and mesmerizes in such a way that it doesn’t matter if the songs are his own compositions or ones sung 200 years ago. He has guested on Patty Griffin's Grammy Award winning "Downtown Church" album and was a featured performer at the 2011 Rock And Roll Hall of Fame's American Music Masters concert celebrating Aretha Franklin.

On 8 February 2015, Farris won the inaugural Grammy Award for Best Roots Gospel Album for Shine For All the People. Read more on Last.fm. User-contributed text is available under the Creative Commons By-SA License; additional terms may apply.