Electric Spice: 01 – Intro to Electric Spice

JULIE LYONN LIEBERMAN has helped develop the multi-style string field over the last forty+ years through her work as an educator, author, radio producer, composer, writer, recording artist, and performer.

She started out as a fiddler, performing at folk festivals and clubs up and down the east coast in the late 1970s/early 1980s using either a mic or a Fishman pickup, depending on the gig. Her introduction to amplification and special effects began while touring with Brian Eno recording artist, Laraaji Venus, in the early 1980s.

She changed over to the L.R. Baggs bridge, then the Zeta transducer bridge, followed by a vintage Barcus Berry violin, a Viper gifted to her by its maker, Mark Wood, on to her three current instruments: the solid-body NS NXT, and two amplified acoustic instruments … the Eastman Series + and the SPUR violin.

Julie Lyonn Lieberman has presented workshops about how to amplify and use special effects as well as multi-style playing and improvisation over the last four decades throughout the United States and abroad to help contemporize string education. She has presented electric stringed instruments and equipment sessions as well as electric strings techniques for the IAJE: International Association for Jazz Education, TODA: Texas Orchestra Directors Association, ASTA: American String Teachers Association, ESTA: European String Teachers Association, as well as state string teacher training sessions and school residencies across the United States and beyond. Her summer program, Strings Without Boundaries—now in its 27th season—introduced workshops on electric strings starting in 2003.

In 2013, Julie created one of the first string orchestra scores (published by Kendor Music) to feature an electric violin part, titled Bollywood Strings. D’Addario worked with her to generate a video tutorial series on YouTube re: how to use an electric for the score, special effects to use, as well as techniques.

Her book, Improvising Violin (Hal Leonard, 1997) was the first book in the world to offer a guide re: going electric. Since then, she has included tutorials in her books, Alternative Styles: The New Curriculum (Hal Leonard, 2004) as well as How to Play Contemporary Strings (Hal Leonard, 2016). Her book, 12 Rock String Lesson Plans, came out in 2006 and the new edition is now available as of April 2021. She has also created a series of video tutorials, featured on [my] Talent Forge, titled Electric Spice (April 2021).

Julie is the recipient of the 2014 American String Teachers Association (ASTA) Kudos Award, over two-dozen ASCAP Plus Awards, eight Meet the Composer awards, and three American String Teachers Association’s National Citation for Leadership & Merit awards. She produced four American Jazz String Summits in the 1980s and 1990s featuring many of the top improvising string players in America, and co-produced three alternative string festivals within American String Teachers Conference in 2003, 2004, and 2005, serving as the chair for the 2004 component. Julie Lyonn Lieberman has presented master classes for ASTA, European String Teachers Association (ESTA), National Association for Music Education (NAfME), International Association for Jazz Eduators (IAJE), the Suzuki Institute, National String Workshop, National Orchestra Festival, International String Workshop, National Young Audiences, and the Carnegie Hall LinkUp Program. She is the author of twelve music books (distributed by Hal Leonard) as well as a memoir, The Roaring Brook Fiddler, five instructional music videos, seven hours of programming for National Public Radio, over two dozen string orchestra scores published by Alfred, Kendor and Carl Fischer, as well as over fifty articles for music magazines.

Julie Lyonn Lieberman is a D’Addario Premiere Clinician and an NS Design Performance Artist.