PETER BRICE
Executive Director, Composer, Ballad Singer, Button Accordionist, Song Collector
Peter Brice sings old songs in a traditional style, and plays Irish traditional music on the button accordion. A native Annapolitan and an exponent of Baltimore, Maryland's Irish traditional music community, Peter's work blends singing and musicianship with musicology and history, humor, colorful design, and a vision for traditional culture as a foundation for an intellectual life.
A lifelong singer, Peter has married a repertoire of American historical songs with a wide-ranging English-language style that he gleaned from his mentors Dónal Maguire, Louisa Jo Killen, and Lisa Null, as well as from members of his family.
His playing reflects his admiration for Galway accordionists such as Joe Cooley and Kevin Keegan—a style into which he was initiated by Brooklyn-born accordionist and National Heritage Fellow Billy McComiskey. He advanced his playing under the tutelage of Derek Hickey from Adare, County Limerick.
The core of Peter’s public work is the collection and revival of traditional music from Maryland, to which end, even as a teenager, he was rescuing orally-transmitted songs from local people who were born in the early 20th century. He has collected and collated the compositions of Billy McComiskey, and is continuously collecting Irish and American traditional music in Baltimore and Anne Arundel County.
Peter is a steadfast teacher of traditional singing, and trains children and adults in vocal technique, traditional style, and declamation. He also teaches the button accordion, music theory, and, as an affiliate to Irish dancing schools, supplements dance instruction with an architecture for developing proficiency in Irish traditional music.
He is a former vice-chair of Comhaltas Ceoltóirí Éireann’s O’Neill-Malcom Branch in Washington, D.C. and a past co-coordinator of the Washington Folk Festival. He founded the Baltimore Singers Club with singers Andy O’Brien and Pat Egan to promote traditional singing in Maryland, and was a founding member of the Old Bay Ceili Band. With singers Lisa Null and Judy Cook, he created a project—Yankee Frolics—to revive traditional songs about the War of 1812 for the bicentennial of that conflict.
In 2014, he and his mentor Billy McComiskey were recognized by the Maryland State Arts Council as a traditional arts master-apprentice pair. He received the Maryland Traditions Apprenticeship Award again in 2019 with singer Lisa Null. He has independently written over $32,000 in awarded grants for Maryland's Irish traditional music community. A graduate of the Peabody Conservatory Preparatory program, Peter also holds a BA in Irish Traditional Music and Dance from the University of Limerick. He has served the New Century American Irish-Arts Company as its executive director since its inception in 2011.