Dan Levenson is an old-time music performer, teacher, storyteller, documentarian, and organizer who has left his mark on today’s folk and traditional music community. He has expanded the reach of traditional music into the broader music and popular community. He has been awarded two Master Artist awards (2017 and 2021) from the Southwest Folklife Alliance to teach an apprentice student for a year each. Fiddler Magazine’s Bob Buckingham described him as “an accomplished fiddler and …one of the best clawhammer banjo players in the country.” Fellow clawhammer banjo player and Teacher Ken Perlman once referred to him as, “the Johnny Appleseed of the banjo”. Dan is one of those musicians who didn’t just learn traditional music — he lived his way into it and has spent decades helping carry it forward.

Dan was born in Pittsburgh, PA, a major city in the northern region of the Southern Appalachians. Dan’s parents met at a square dance, and they immersed him in folk and traditional music and dance. His father, Fred, called square dances and his mother, Naomi, played guitar, piano, and sang in her temple choir. Dan was singing and playing music by his fifth birthday and teaching guitar by age 16.

Dan started his professional music career in the mid 1980’s. He has studied and played with many of the great old-time players both young and old including Clyde Davenport, Charlie Acuff, Clifford Hardesty (who made Dan’s fiddles), Lester Raber with whom he spent years learning their music and becoming their friend.

Dan’s Boiled Buzzard String Band traveled the United States playing concerts and dances. Their four professional recordings became the basis of the old-time repertoire and are still popular and available to old-time music aficionados today. Steve Davis of The Devils’ Box Magazine called them “the most influential string band since Highwoods (String Band).”

Through his folk and traditional arts practice, Dan’s exemplary achievements have contributed to our nation’s distinctive cultural heritage, increasing opportunities for the public to encounter art forms and cultural traditions and demonstrated the importance of the arts to personal, cultural and national identity both with his performing and teaching as well as having founded two 501(c)(3) organizations along the way to help spread the word. Both of those, Folknet, Inc. in Northeastern, OH and the Southwest Old-Time String Band Association, Inc. are still active today.

Over Dan’s career he has published 16 books of instruction and repertoire for clawhammer banjo and old-time fiddle with Mel Bay Publications including the landmark Clawhammer Banjo From Scratch, (A fiddle version is also available), a guide based on his traveling workshop Meet the Banjo ™ where for more than five years, Dan brought banjos provided by the Deering Banjo company to introduce people – often with no musical background – to the 5 string banjo. His most recent book, Dan Levenson’s Master Collection of Old-Time Tunes is a collection of over 300 tunes popular with the traditional music community today. He has also recorded eight albums of music, both with his band and as a solo performer. People still love his solo clawhammer banjo recording “Bare Naked Banjos”. These have been seen by many as significant contributions to living traditional arts, source communities and/or transmission of traditional knowledge to future generations.

Demonstrating Dan’s record of continuing artistic accomplishment and actively participating in his art form as a practitioner, mentor, and community scholar, Dan continues to tour in this country and others. He was the United States headliner at the first Irish old-time Music festival in Lisdoonvarna, Ireland; a featured performer at the Gainsboro old-time music festival in England, and the Banjo Guru at the San Paolo, Brazil Musicale International. His current band, Dan Levenson and the Cat Mountain Rounders, plays regularly in his adopted home town Tucson, AZ and the surrounding area.

Other awards over the years have included winning the 2005 Ohio Clawhammer Banjo Championship and Grand Champion at the 2010 Ajo, AZ Old-Time Fiddlers Association fiddle contest. Dan was also voted one of the top 10 clawhammer banjo players by Banjo Newsletter readers.

Dan’s performances and workshops have been presented at such renowned folk and music schools and festivals such as John C. Campbell Folk School, Mars Hill University, Maryland Banjo Academy, The Ozark Folk Center in Arkansas, Banjo Camp North, Steve Kaufman Camp, The California Bluegrass Association’s Summer Music Camp, and The Rolland Fiddle Camp. Dan also performs at local community concerts, dances, market venues, and festivals including Tucson Meet Yourself and the Matheson Music festivals in Arizona.

Dan Levenson’s performance footprint spans national festivals and concerts throughout the United States, international appearances in Europe, the Middle East, and South America, and educational residencies, workshops, and community-based musical gatherings that reflect his dual role as both performer and tradition-bearer in old-time music. It has been a remarkable lifetime so far of music, dance, writing, teaching and spreading the word about United States traditional music – our national heritage.