Biography

The gentle, dreamy textures of Heather Woods Broderick's indie folk songs reside in nature and moments of deep reflection. An itinerant backing bandmember and studio musician based in Brooklyn, she has collaborated with artists such as Sharon Van Etten, M. Ward, and Laura Gibson. Her solo recording debut, the hushed, acoustic From the Ground, arrived in 2009 before she expanded her meditative sound with electronics on albums including 2019's Invitation and 2023's Labyrinth. Heather Woods Broderick was born and raised in Maine until her parents, both musicians, moved the family across the country to Oregon when she was eight. A multi-instrumentalist who studied the piano from shortly after the move through college, Broderick played with bands including Loch Lomond, indie folk collective Horse Feathers, and post-rock group Efterklang during the 2000s. Broderick recorded her first solo album, From the Ground, in 2009. Produced by her brother, composer/musician/engineer Peter Broderick, it was released by Australian label Preservation before receiving a vinyl release by Digitalis Recordings the following year. Around that time, she also appeared on albums by, among others, M. Ward and Blitzen Trapper. Her contributions to albums by Nightlands (2013's Oak Island) and Sharon Van Etten (2014's Are We There and 2015's I Don't Want to Let You Down) could be heard before the arrival of her second LP, 2015's Glider, on Western Vinyl. It added atmospheric electronic components to her sound. Meanwhile, she continued to tour behind songwriters including Van Etten, Laura Gibson, and Damien Jurado. In the later 2010s, Broderick guested on albums by Dave Depper and In Tall Buildings, and she contributed synthesizer, Wurlitzer, and backing vocals to Van Etten's January 2019 release Remind Me Tomorrow. Three months later, Western Vinyl issued the Broderick album Invitation. It was written during and inspired by a sojourn in coastal Pacific City, Oregon, a childhood summer spot for the Broderick family and found her expanding her use of electronics. She followed that with a cello drone album, Domes, on the Dauw tape label in 2022 before returning to Western Vinyl for her fifth studio album, April 2023's Labyrinth. It continued to explore the use of electronics and restrained beats in her ethereal songs. ~ Marcy Donelson, Rovi