Entrepreneur creates new business to promote music education in scenic locations.
Julie Sullivan Brace is accustomed to wearing many hats. After 46 years as a highly successful art director and graphic designer, including 35 years in Flagstaff, she is slowly and joyfully easing into retirement from her Shine Creative Industries design and marketing firm, as she builds a new venture, the Musical Meanderings Series, an extension of her Roots and Boots Music Camp (RBMC), started in 2019 and inspired by the bluegrass tradition.
This musical move is not a big stretch, as Sullivan Brace is an accomplished guitarist and songwriter who is also well known for co-founding Pickin’ in the Pines, the beloved bluegrass and acoustic music festival, now in its 18th year in the cool September pines of Fort Tuthill.
Today, she hopes to aim for a larger view, beyond retirement. “The story of me retiring is kind of boring and old,” she said. “I’ve always had the sideline of music, but now I’m transitioning to really just only music, including performing and curating these events.”
Her passion for music began early in life when she learned to play guitar at 14. It continued as a young adult, when she moved to Berkeley, California, from Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, after college as an art student and fledgling guitar player. She began jamming in local coffee houses.
She found that music, specifically bluegrass, was a universal language and that she could go anywhere in the world and find people to play with. Educating, sharing and inspiring others to play music is still at the root of her musical drive, and the popular Roots and Boots Music Camp continues in that tradition. It has afforded a strong foundation for launching the new Musical Meanderings Series, a sub-brand of RBMC that can go anywhere.
The first music camp in 2019 was at Arizona Nordic Village and was a great success, she says. However, the pandemic and forest closures derailed the camp in 2020 and 2021. The camp was back on track in 2022 and 2023, with a change of venue to Camp Colton.
The Musical Meandering Series was officially born after she received an ARTx grant from Creative Flagstaff to provide live music with local and regional musicians to accompany many of the exhibits and events that happened during its 10-day festival.
The music served not only as entertainment, but also as a means to direct and drive audiences to specific events and galleries.
“It’s not really my story so much,” she continued, “but [the grant] did inspire the idea for Musical Meanderings and gave me the green light for understanding that I could take music and music education and support anywhere, like on rivers, oceans, in foreign countries. It affirmed a dream that I wanted to pursue.”
Sullivan Brace expects more manifestations of her dream to unfold with a Musical Meanderings journey of music education and adventure during a scheduled three-day trip on the San Juan River, Oct. 6-9, from Sand Island to Mexican Hat, Utah.
Featured musicians on the river trip include two national flatpicking guitar champions, Tyler Grant and Peter McLaughlin, and multi-instrumentalist Chris Brashear. “All three are incredibly talented singer-songwriters whose passion for wilderness shines through their original material,” she said.
The music featured will be mostly bluegrass and acoustic folk, and passengers are encouraged to bring their instruments and join in on the nightly jamming. “We’ll have the ability for people to store their own instruments in big dry bags on a dedicated baggage boat. Of course, you can’t bring an upright bass, but I always bring my guitar on the river trips!”
The trip is outfitted by Tse Kooh Outfitters, the only commercial outfitter to have full access to the archeological sites on the Diné side of the river. “The bigger story is the collaborations that take musical education to different, fun locations,” said Sullivan Brace. “The collaborations I’m doing now exponentially lift others, not just me. You bring community in, and from there, it takes on its own collective personality.”
Another Musical Meanderings event is “Give Birth to your Mirth,” a three-day singing and journaling retreat for women, scheduled for Nov. 7-10, at La Posada Hotel, the restored Fred Harvey Hotel in Winslow.
Participants should not be afraid to sing, she said. “Anyone can sing; very few people can’t. I encourage people to sing. When in a group, it’s more comfortable; you can match you voice to someone else’s.”
Singer-songwriters Christine Sanders and Trish Jahnke will be facilitating during the Musical Meanderings. Sullivan Brace’s husband, musician Roger Brace, also will be assisting.
“He has continuously supported all these endeavors silently in the background – setting up canopies, fixing anything and everything, driving me places, coming to all my gigs,” she said. “He is incredibly loving and supportive of all my crazy schemes.” FBN
By Betsey Bruner, FBN
For more information about Roots and Boots Music Camp and the Musical Meanderings Series, contact Julie Sullivan Brace at https://rootsandbootsmusiccamp.com/2024-events/.